
flass 'B Xk>333 
Rnnir ■Org' H U 
Copyright^? 



CQEXRIGHT DEFOSm 



HONEST DEBTORS 




ORRIN PHILIP GIFFORD, D. D. 



HONEST DEBTORS 



SERMONS AND ADDRESSES 



By 
ORRIN PHILIP GIFFORD, D. D. 



PHILADELPHIA 

THE JUDSON PRESS 

BOSTON CHICAGO ST. LOUIS LOS ANGELES 

KANSAS CITY SEATTLE TORONTO 






Copyright, 1922, by 
GILBERT N. BRINK, Secretary 



Published October, 1922 



©CI.A686788 



Frinted in U. S. A. 



NOV 13 '22 



PREFACE 



Many of the addresses of Doctor Gifford from pulpit 
and platform have been printed and circulated in more or 
less ephemeral form as pamphlets or as newspaper articles. 
Much of his work exists in type-script as it was prepared 
for the author's own convenience. By the courtesy of 
Doctor Gifford a selection from each of these bodies of 
material has been made available to the publishers of 
this volume. 

For the arrangement of the material the publishers 
are responsible, but the sermons and addresses appear 
as they were delivered, substantially unchanged, with all 
their wealth of allusions to the events of the times that 
gave them occasion. 

The well-known abilities of Doctor Gifford that have 
given his work charm and appeal are strikingly in evi- 
dence here : Fulness of thought, and compression of ut- 
terance ; a wide range of information, furnishing a well- 
ordered treasury of apt illustration, and epigrammatical 
statement that proves the artist's patience and skill in 
clarifying, crystallizing, and cutting his gems of ex- 
pression. 

Not alone style will be remarked, but useful matter also. 
The sermon that occupies the title role, and some of its 
immediate associates, cannot fail to be of interest and 
service in these years when Christian living is rightly in- 
terpreted in Jesus' own terms as Stewardship of Life. 

The Judson Press. 
Philadelphia, Pa., August 30, 1922. 



CONTENTS 

PART I 
SERMONS 

CHAPTB1 PAGE 

I. Honest Debtors 3 

II. Hope of Gains 14 

III. Christian Use of Money 22 

IV. Religion and Business 33 

V. The Holy Spirit 42 

VI. The Spirit's Birthday 51 

VII. Filled with the Spirit 61 

VIII. A Real Revival 70 

IX. Redemption Through Blood 80 

X. Salvation by Christ 91 

XL The Christ-type 102 

XII. Conquest for Christ 112 

XIII. Christ Our Peace 123 

XIV. God's Purpose in Christ 133 

XV. Your Life Hid in Christ 142 

XVI. The Life of Faith 154 

XVII. Authority in Religion 163 

XVIII. My Shepherd 172 



CONTENTS 

PART II 
ADDRESSES 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. Is Life Worth Living? 181 

II. Character a Credit Man's Asset 193 

III. Christian Science 201 

IV, Soul-winning 218 

V. Adoniram Judson 229 

VI. Religious Liberty 240 



PART I 
SERMONS 



HONEST DEBTORS 

" I am debtor both to the Greeks, and to the Barbarians ; both 
to the wise, and to the unwise. So, as much as in me is, I am 
ready to preach the gospel to you that are at Rome also." — 
Romans 1 : 14, 15. 

Three civilizations meet at the Cross of Christ. Lan- 
guage is the highest possible expression of thought. 
Thought is the soul of civilization. Governments decay ; 
institutions perish ; buildings go into ruins ; but language 
persists. 

The empire founded by Alexander is a haunting 
memory ; the thoughts wrought out by Socrates and Plato 
are persistent. Alexander entrusted his thoughts to in- 
stitutions and forms of government; Plato and Socrates 
entrusted their thoughts to the Greek language. 

Christ built no cities, founded no governments, left no 
institutions, but the thoughts of Christ have reorganized 
the world. He entrusted them to words. The Hebrew, 
the Greek, and the Latin civilizations voiced one common 
thought : " Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews." 

Three Civilizations Met in Paul 

Three civilizations met in Paul — the Hebrew, the 
Roman, and the Christian. He was a Hebrew, of the 
seed of Abraham, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of 
Benjamin; born and reared in a Jewish home, educated 
in Jewish schools. But it is not a Hebrew who says : 
u I am debtor both to the Greeks and to the barbarians ; 

3 



4 HONEST DEBTORS 

both to the wise, and to the unwise. So, as much as in 
me is, I am ready to preach the gospel to you that are 
at Rome also/' The Jew had no sense of obligation to 
the world. He dealt in cash payments wherever he went. 
Paul Kriiger of South Africa welcomed no nation to his 
republic; he stood fully armed beating back the British 
invasion. All who entered the Transvaal must comply 
with the institutions when they entered. So Paul the 
Pharisee would not cross the street to make a convert. 
He would go from Jerusalem to Damascus to hinder an 
onslaught. The religion of the Jew brought no sense of 
obligation. 

It is not Paul the Roman who says : " I am a debtor 
both to the Greeks, and to the barbarians; both to the 
wise, and to the unwise." Rome owed nothing to the 
world. The world owed everything to Rome, and she 
was busy collecting her debts. She pushed her collec- 
tions out to the ends of the world ; she assessed her taxes 
on kingdoms and empires; she sat at the receipt of cus- 
toms in the four quarters of the globe. 

But a new civilization had come into Paul's heart and 
life — the Christian. He stood at the ends of the two 
civilizations and at the beginning of another. He said : 
" I, Paul the Christian, am debtor to the Greeks, and to 
the barbarians ; to the wise, and to the unwise." 

Christ introduced a new principle of life. The debtor 
is commonly thought of as one who owes for what he 
has bought and has not paid for. A man buys a house ; 
he pays $2,000 down, and gives a mortgage for the rest, 
and the borrower is evermore the slave of the lender. If 
a tenant cannot pay his rent, he is put out on the street, 
and loses nothing. A man with a mortgage who does 
not pay his interest loses all that he has put in. The 
merchant belongs to the debtor class. He stocks his 



,i 



HONEST DEBTORS 5 

shelves with goods that are not paid for. The purchaser, 
leaning over the counter and running his eye up and down 
the stock, envies the merchant. So the debtor class is 
the class that owes for what it seems to have and has not 
yet paid for. What had the Greek and the barbarian, 
the wise and the unwise, done for Paul that he was in 
debt to them? Nothing. But the new principle is that 
the man who has the truth is in debt to the man who 
lacks the truth. The man who has power is in debt to 
the man who is weak. So, as much as in him is, he 
is under obligation to share his truth with the man who 
has it not. 

One day one of the Pharisees asked Christ, " What is 
the greatest commandment ? " And he said, " Thou shalt 
love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy 
soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; 
and thy neighbor as thyself ." And the man said, " Who 
is my neighbor ? " Jesus answered, " A certain man went 
down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among thieves, 
who stripped him and left him half-dead. ,, A rich priest 
and a Levite went by that way. They stood near enough 
to see him, but he had done nothing for them, therefore 
they were under no obligation to do anything for him, 
and they passed by on the other side. A Samaritan, 
coming that way with his beast of burden, saw him. 
The man had done nothing for him, but he could do 
something for the man, therefore he was a debtor. 
" Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." Put your- 
self in the man's place, and if, by the wayside, you find 
a man stripped and half dead, your beast of burden be- 
longs to him ; your cash and credit belong to him ; your 
strength and time belong to him. That is not Judaism ; 
that is not Roman Imperialism; that is Christianity. 
But there are a great many in the Christian church who 



6 HONEST DEBTORS 

still think that indebtedness arises when some one has 
done something for you. It arises when you can do 
something for the other man. 

The Civilization the World Lacks 

What had Paul that the world lacked? The gospel. 
The gospel is made up of facts and truths. The facts of 
the gospel are about a dozen. Jesus of Nazareth was 
born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of Herod the 
King. He was taken down into Egypt to save his life. 
He was reared in a humble home in Nazareth. He was 
baptized for the fulfilment of righteousness. He received 
the gift of the Holy Ghost. He was tempted forty days 
in the wilderness. He came out and gave his life to the 
world in teaching. He was convicted of blasphemy, for 
he made himself the Son of God. He died on the cross ; 
he was buried in a borrowed tomb ; he arose the third day, 
and ascended on high, leading captivity captive. He 
poured out the Spirit on his waiting disciples of the 
world. These are the facts. But inside this row of 
facts is a mighty truth. " God so loved the world that 
he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever shall be- 
lieve in him shall have everlasting lif e." " As Moses 
lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son 
of Man be lifted up," that he may draw all men toward 
him. He bore our sins in his own body on the tree. He 
is the resurrection and the life. The man who grasps 
these facts by faith, grasps the truth, and the truth re- 
generates. The wire on Elmwood Avenue is visible ; the 
current is invisible. When the trolley-wheel touches the 
visible wire with a visible touch, the invisible current 
drives the car. The body of man is made of the dust of 
the earth; the soul is the breath of God. He who re- 
ceives the body, receives the soul. If your friend should 



HONEST DEBTORS 7 

telegraph you tomorrow from Washington, " I am com- 
ing," and should die on the way, you would not welcome 
the body. The body has been forwarded without the 
spirit — the fact without the truth. The fact in Jesus 
Christ's gospel carried truth, truth that regenerates and 
redeems. What the soul is to the body, what the current 
is to the wire, the truth is to the fact. He who presents 
the facts by faith, and he who lays hold of the facts by 
faith, lays hold of the truth, and it is the truth that gives 
strength and righteousness. 

Now, this gospel that Paul was ready to preach at 
Rome and thus discharge his indebtedness, was the power 
of God unto salvation. So what Rome lacked is power. 
The morning lesson from the first chapter of the Epistle 
of Paul to the Romans, is a true photograph of Rome, 
and Rome wallowed in its weakness. It was unable to 
strengthen itself into the likeness of God's thought. 
What the world lacks today is power. The forces of 
nature are terrific, and the laboratory of nature is packed 
with men who are searching for power. Civilization 
waits on power. When man found a beast of burden 
that could carry his load for him, half the work was 
done. When he found steam-power that carried him and 
his burden, the journey became a delight. We have 
passed on now to electric-power, and new ranges of 
achievement have now opened to us. When we mastered 
the perpendicular railroad, we ran our buildings twenty 
stories toward the clouds. 

The world waits for power. Every grain of sand on 
the seashore struggles toward the center of the earth. 
And the whole force of gravity is to make matter a dead 
weight. When man wants to make a building, he has to 
get under and lift against this force of gravity. When 
he has power to do the building, then building is a pastime 



8 HONEST DEBTORS 

and amusement. Men's minds are filled with great ideas. 
They wait for power to execute them. Oh, if men were 
only strong to carry out their thoughts? If you were 
only as good in the street as you muse yourself to be by 
the fireside! But when I do good, evil is ever present 
with me. It is the dead weight. Who shall deliver me 
from the body of this death? I want power. That is 
what the world wants. That is what the gospel of Jesus 
Christ gives, and the man who has found the secret of 
power, and refuses to share it, is a thief. The man who 
knows how to save the soul, and is mute and dumb, is a 
bad man. Wherever this gospel has gone and has been 
received, it has proved itself to be a power of God to 
salvation. Now the man who has a truth like that and 
will not share it, is worse than the heathen who waits for 
it. And Paul, knowing he had this power in his own 
keeping, acknowledged himself an honest debtor, and said 
he was willing to preach the gospel of that power to the 
weakness of Rome. The gospel of Christ is the right- 
eousness of God. 

Men are not only weak, but they are wicked. When 
they get strength, they use it to carry out wicked pur- 
poses. What man lacks is righteousness of motive, of 
thought, of act. An unseen finger has written on the 
walls of our modern civilization this simple question, 
" What would Jesus do? " The business man lifting his 
eyes from his desk, finds it written on the walls of his 
counting-room; the school-teacher on the walls of the 
schoolroom; the doctor on the walls of his office; the 
woman on the walls of her home — What would Jesus do ? 
That question was answered over eighteen hundred years 
ago when Jesus told us what God did do in the flesh ; for 
Jesus Christ is God manifest in the flesh, and Jesus Christ 
is the righteousness of God. He is the right kind of a 



HONEST DEBTORS 9 

life, and the man who follows Christ's example, lives a 
righteous life. 

How the New Civilization Comes 

Paul stands there in his power of righteousness and 
his power of religion, and says, " I am willing to share 
it with the men of Rome/' It is a curious thing that 
men put thoughts into words, and these words and 
thoughts taken into life, transform life; and yet the 
mind is so made that that is a fact of life. 

Suppose a man does not pay his honest debts — he 
shrinks from his obligations. First of all, he wrongs 
his neighbors. I have a friend living in a suburb near 
Boston. He belongs to the vast class of suburban 
dwellers in that section of the country; his office is in 
Boston, his home in the suburbs. And he tells me of this 
curious condition of things. He found that he must pay 
two, three, or ten cents more for everything he buys in 
the suburbs than he pays in the city. He asked a neigh- 
bor for the secret of this, and the neighbor said : " My 
grocer tells me that it is because a certain proportion of 
the people who live in the suburbs never pay their debts, 
and the dealers, to save themselves from bankruptcy, 
must spread it over the honest people." This gentleman 
was standing one morning on the street corner, over 
against the finest tenement in the block. A grocer was 
wearing out his knuckles on a back door. He turned to 
this gentleman finally, saying, " Do you know where 
Mr. R. has moved to?" The gentleman replied, "No, 
I do not." With a sigh, the grocer said : " It is always 
so. He owes me $75." He has saved that out of the 
community. So, down in that section, the average sub- 
urbanite never buys a house ; he gets a month's rent and 
then flees in the night-time. Now, in order to strike a 

B 



10 HONEST DEBTORS 

general average, it must be spread out over the commu- 
nity, and honesty pays the debts of dishonesty. 

You take a church that is made up of five hundred 
members, two hundred and fifty of whom shirk their 
honest obligations in caring for the home and the foreign 
work, and the load comes with double burden on the 
honest members of that church; for if it is dishonest to 
rob your grocer, it is as dishonest to rob your God; if 
it is dishonest to rob your landlord, it is just as dishonest 
to rob your Christ. And the result of it is a low spiritual 
temperature all through the church. It is a burden on 
the honest people when men will get the advantage of a 
Christian civilization and not do their part in bearing its 
burdens. " I am a debtor," said Paul. You are no less 
debtors. What have you done to share the gospel that 
is so much to you with the world? Ever and again on 
the street I see a boy who has managed to get a " hitch " ; 
he is getting a ride for nothing. The Christian church 
has a great many " hitched " on who are getting their 
gospel without paying their fare for riding. It is a 
double burden. 

In the second place, the dishonest man injures himself 
more than he injures his fellow. I would rather live in 
a neighborhood where I had to pay ten cents a pound 
more for my butter, and fifteen dollars more for my 
rental, and pay it, than to be the man who will eat butter 
at my expense and live in a house for which I pay. 

The Master said that a nobleman went away into a far 
country, and before he went, he left talents to his slaves ; 
and one slave with one talent wrapped it in a napkin and 
buried it, and it stayed there undisturbed ; and the man 
seemed to be as well off while the master was gone. The 
master returned, and that was the day of judgment. 
The talent was dug up and carried to the master ; it was 



HONEST DEBTORS 11 

taken from the man, and he was cast into outer darkness. 
But science teaches us that the day of judgment is now; 
the disintegration of character goes on now, and the man 
need not wait for the nobleman to return, but the disin- 
tegration begins with the first shovelful of earth that is 
dug — begins with the thought that prompts the digging. 
There is not only unfolding into a nobler life, but there 
is degenerating into a viler life. 

One of the saddest studies of Christian character is 
this : To see a man take the gospel of Christ and refuse 
to obey its genius, and lose its power in his own life. 
Charles Darwin said that when he was a young man he 
was charmed with poetry and delighted with music; but 
when he became an old man, he writes that Shakespeare 
nauseates him, poetry has lost its charm, and music is a 
bore ; and he says, " The upper part of my nature seems 
to be atrophied in such things." He has tracked the 
earthworm so long that he has lost touch with the genius 
of Shakespeare. When he was on board the steamer 
Beagle he was laughed at by the sailors because he was 
orthodox in his belief of the Bible. When he became 
an old man he says, " I must write myself an agnostic." 
He had measured the length of an earthworm and lost 
God; he had mastered the secret of the plant and lost 
eternal life; he had found a monkey and lost heaven. 
He did not need to wait for the day of judgment. His 
day of judgment overtook him this side of the grave, and 
he stumbled wearily into the kindly arms of mother earth, 
having lost his faith, lost his knowledge, lost his moral 
impulse and power, because he had not been keen enough 
to see that the laws of God run through the religious life 
just as surely as they run through nature. 

The man who holds this gospel truth, that holds in 
itself power, and refuses to obey the genius of that 



12 HONEST DEBTORS 

gospel, loses the power of it, and loses the righteousness 
of it; and there is the secret of the non-development of 
this power of a Christian character, right under the 
shadow of the altars of a living God. 

Some months ago a minister in the great Northwest, 
going out to look up a mission field, knowing that there 
were deer in the forest just beyond, made an arrangement 
with a merchant in the town to go with him on a deer- 
hunt. A light snow had fallen the night before. They 
separated, the business man going to the left, and the 
minister to the right. They made an appointment to 
meet at a certain tree. The minister took the gun, the 
compass, and some matches, and journeyed into the 
woods. The business man swung around and came to 
the tree at the appointed time, and the minister was not 
there. He waited awhile and then went back to the town 
to meet a business engagement. The night fell. They 
formed a searching-party; they followed the minister by 
the tracks in the snow until they found he had tracked a 
deer; they went after him for over a mile, until they came 
to where he found he was lost, and knew it. He went 
back and got his gun and matches, and looked at his 
compass and then started off into the woods again. He 
laid his gun against a tree and studied his compass, and 
deliberately marched away from the town. They found 
him about midnight shivering over a little forest fire, and 
when they asked him why he did not follow the compass, 
he said, " When it said south, I knew it meant north." 
He was wiser than his compass. There he sat waiting 
for some one to find him, because he knew more than his 
compass. 

Men, women, have you grown wiser than the Word of 
God? The Word of God points you to the mission field. 
Are you going, in your thoughts and in your sympathies, 



HONEST DEBTORS 13 

in your prayers and in your gifts? The world points you 
to the unsaved soul beneath your own roof, to the man 
you do business with, to your neighbor across the way. 
The gospel of Christ has become very dim and indistinct, 
it has lost its power over your life ; you are not as right- 
eous as you were ten years ago. Why? Because as a 
dishonest Christian you have not paid your debts. Power 
and righteousness, to be realized, must be shared. The 
gospel, to be known, must be preached and lived and 
shared ; and the man who shrinks from the genius of it, 
loses the power of it. 



II 

HOPE OF GAINS 

"And when her masters saw that the hope of their gains was 
gone, they caught Paul and Silas, and drew them into the market- 
place unto the rulers/' — Acts 16 : 19. 

In the Hebrew record of the Exodus we read that the 
pillar of cloud and fire served two purposes. It was a 
guide to Israel and destroyed Egypt. From it Jehovah 
looked upon Israel, and there was light ; he looked upon 
Egypt, and the way was dark. The slave escaped, the 
master was overwhelmed. Walls of water stood up on 
either side, and Israel passed through dry-shod ; the walls 
toppled over, chariot-wheels stuck, horses tangled in their 
harness, and soldiers were anchored by their armor. 

The Double Meaning of God 

Centuries after the Exodus, descendants of the escaped 
slaves kept the feast of the Tabernacles once a year in 
memory of the tent life in the wilderness. The evening 
before the beginning of the feast, two huge lamps, one 
upon each side of the altar of burnt-offering, were lighted 
as the darkness gathered. They poured out a flood of 
light on temple, courts, streets, and over the walls of the 
city into the gorge beyond. Troops of worshipers danced 
and sang praises in the light. The lamps were symbols 
of the pillar of fire. Standing in the flood of light Christ 
said : " I am the light of the world. He that f olloweth 
me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light 
of life/' 
14 



HOPE OF GAINS 15 

God revealed himself in two ways through the pillar, 
saving and destroying. God revealed himself in two 
ways through Christ, saving and destroying. " The Son 
of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost." 
" I am come to destroy the devil and his works." " God 
is love." " God is a consuming fire." The same God 
who called Moses to carry Israel across the desert, as a 
nurse carries a sick child, bade him smite Egypt, turn 
the empire into a huge morgue. " There was not a house 
without one dead." Bade him scourge the land till it 
writhed in agony, bade him bury the Egyptian army in 
an unmarked grave. The God who made the heavens 
and the earth, and gave the earth to the children of men, 
who walked with man in the cool of the day, drove him 
from the garden, and fastened the earth like a burden 
upon the bowed back of labor. Love demands love, if it 
gets hate it curdles. Purity demands purity, if it gets 
impurity it revolts ; righteousness, if it gets unrighteous- 
ness, flames. The more I love my friend the more I give, 
the more I demand. If a man does not care for a woman 
he takes no notice of her character, actions, company; 
but if he gives her his heart, he demands a return. A 
man fences his field and guards what he loves. Because 
he loves his boy he demands carefulness of life. " The 
Lord our God is a jealous God." The shackles that fell 
from Israel broke the heart of Egypt. 

The same truth comes out in nature. The force of 
gravity holds the stones in place to shelter the worshiper, 
to give an oasis of silence in a sea of noise; but if you 
step from the pinnacle the same force will crush out your 
life on the pavement below. The third rail is alive to 
drive the car and to murder the man who touches it. 
Water in the stomach quenches thirst and prolongs life; 
in the lungs, it strangles and shortens life. The same 



16 HONEST DEBTORS 

Christ who bent tenderly over the sinning woman and 
bade her go in peace, smote the cheek of hypocrisy till it 
tingles through the centuries. The Christ who said, 
" Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid 
them not," also said, " It is better for a man that a mill- 
stone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the 
sea, than that he should cause one of these little ones to 
stumble. " It is better to go without dividends than to 
declare them at the cost of child labor. The same Christ 
who bade all weary and heavy-laden laborers come unto 
him and rest, denounced the religious leaders of his day 
as hypocrites, whited sepulchers, not merely caretakers 
in a graveyard, but themselves graves. He pictured a 
great white throne : before it came nations, and from it 
went men to joy and heaven, and also men to hell and 
torment. 

God revealed himself in Egypt, saving and smiting. 
God reveals himself in nature, curing and killing. God 
reveals himself in Christ, drawing to himself and driving 
from himself. Christ is a savor of life unto life, and of 
death unto death. In the parade of the Roman con- 
queror the clouds of incense meant victory to the Roman, 
slavery to the conquered. 

To Destroy Demons, to Save Men 

This same God was in Paul on European soil. When 
Paul walked the streets of Philippi, he was the Christian 
church entering Europe. He spoke mercy to Lydia by 
the riverside, hope to the jailer in the prison, but cast out 
the demon from the slave girl, and bankrupted the 
syndicate that drew gains from her shame. 

Christians must face evil as well as seek prayer- 
meetings. The cloud must destroy Egypt as well as save 
Israel, nay, rather, it must destroy Egypt to save Israel. 



HOPE OF GAINS 17 

Christ must cast out demons as well as save men. To 
save men he must cast out demons. The church must 
smite evil as well as comfort weakness, must smite in 
order to comfort. A knife is better than a poultice in 
treating a cancer. 

Christ was merciful with men, but merciless with 
demons, and if men become identified with demons they 
must suffer the consequences. It is not enough to use 
the street in going from home to prayer-meeting; we 
must cleanse it of demons. The church has the con- 
science of the community, has the open vision. " If the 
light that is in you be darkness, how great is that dark- 
ness/' When Sinai was used as a stable for the Egyp- 
tian calf, the Law was in danger; both could not exist 
together in the same camp. When the temple court was 
used as an exchange, the true worship was in peril. Cattle 
and Christ could not be in the temple court at the same 
time. The church would save more men if she had more 
power over demons that ruin men. Buddha was in the 
passive voice, Christ was in the active voice ; we have a 
great many Buddhas in the modern church. 

In casting out the demon that enslaved the girl he 
struck the men who profited by her slavery. This blow 
revealed their motive — "hope of gain." 

The Motive That Is as Gravity 

Motives give character to deeds. What the soul is to 
the body, motive is to action. "As a man thinketh in 
his heart, so is he," and his thoughts give meaning to 
his deeds. The act may be the same, its effect the 
same on the man acted upon, but the reaction utterly 
unlike. A man is drowning, another man plunges in 
and saves him at the risk of his own life. " Greater 
love hath no man than this, that he will lay down his 



18 HONEST DEBTORS 

life for his friend." The heroic act fills the papers, 
the man steps into the temple of fame. We learn later 
that the man saved him that he might punish him; 
drowning was too easy, the savior had pursued this 
man for months, and plunged in to get a grip on him 
and torment him for years. The public changes its 
judgment. We learn later that the man was employed 
to track the would-be suicide, was promised a thou- 
sand dollars to save him if he attempted death; we 
lose interest in the man who will risk death for dollars 
— that is the national disease. We learn that the man 
who plunged in was a stranger, but risked death for a 
Carnegie medal ; we lose interest in him. Hope of 
gain does not appeal to the heroic in man, it is too com- 
mon a motive, it is as wide-spread as the force of gravity, 
it holds too many of us down to earth. It is the main- 
spring in the mechanism of the commercial watch. Of 
all motives that ensoul the deed the commonest and the 
meanest is hope of gain. John Milton tells us that the 
least erect of all the spirits that fell from heaven was 
Mammon. He trod the pavement of heaven face down, 
and so was compelled to face the burning marl of hell 
when lost. Motive shapes a man's attitude and habit and 
so determines character. 

Achan, tell me, why did you risk the defeat of an army, 
disobey Joshua, steal the gold and garments? " Hope of 
gain." Gehazi, tell me, why did you follow Naaman when 
he went back to Syria, why lie about the coming students 
to the school of the prophets? You, a student, a body- 
servant of Elisha ! why did you risk leprosy ? " Hope of 
gain." Tell me, Judas, son of Kerioth, the only man 
of Judah in the twelve, why did you steal from the 
Bethany home to the temple, sell Jesus for thirty pieces 
of silver, sit with him at supper, follow him to the place 



HOPE OF GAINS 19 

of prayer, kiss him ? " Hope of gain." Tell me, Bene- 
dict Arnold, what motive stirred you that you would 
deliver all you could of the young Republic to England 
for gold? " Hope of gain." 

Why do men strip the hills bare of trees, leave desola- 
tion, challenge floods, turn the life of the forest into the 
dry rot of the yellow press ? " Hope of gain." Why 
do men build great mills, chain childhood to machinery, 
turn youth into money ? " Hope of gain." Why do 
men pack storage warehouses with meat, eggs, butter, 
and pilfer pennies from the pocket of poverty for food ? 
" Hope of gain." Why do men compel the Government 
to pass laws guarding food from lying labels ? " Hope 
of gain." Why do men fasten the burden of license on 
the back of the State, build breweries, distilleries, fit up 
saloons, rot grain,, and rot men? "Hope of gain." 
Why do men plunder government, buy lawmakers, rob 
the Republic? " Hope of gain." Why do men hunt 
the home and sell in the open market white slaves? 
" Hope of gain." Long before the struggle in the streets 
of Philippi, in all the centuries since, hope of gain has 
been a mighty motive driving men as the dynamo drives 
our modern machinery. There is no place in heaven for 
human hearts and wills driven by that motive. " Know 
ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom 
of God?" (Then follow the states that make up the 
republic of unrighteousness:) "Be not deceived: neither 
fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, 
nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor 
covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, 
shall inherit the kingdom of God." Covetousness makes 
a hell of earth : we may be sure there will be no corner 
for it in heaven. Covetousness, like the Dead Sea, soils 
every stream that empties into it. 






20 HONEST DEBTORS 

Covetousness Capitalizing Religion 

Covetousness, hope of gain, reaches the climax when 
it capitalizes religion. Apollo was the sun god of Greece. 
The legend says he slew the Python at Delphi, his spirit 
entered into women who could read the future. The 
Python spirit was believed to be in the slave girl. Men 
bought her, traded through her on the superstition of 
their fellows. Greed of gain cannot go beyond using 
religion for profit, selling salvation for gold, opening the 
future with golden keys, guaranteeing salvation for a 
price, coining superstition by sacrament, offering to 
lessen deserved punishment for gold. These men of 
Macedonia lived on the ignorance of their countrymen, 
using the demonized slave girl for revenue. When the 
demon was out, the power was gone, and then they turned 
on the man who had shorn them of power. The demon 
went out when bidden; covetousness began to rage. It 
is easier to cast out demons than to cure covetousness. 
Avarice and appetite are the warp and woof of the liquor 
traffic. Francis Murphy could conquer appetite in thou- 
sands, but who can conquer avarice? Keeley can con- 
quer that appetite, but the gold cure cannot master the 
thirst for gold. There are physical limits to love of 
liquor, but no limit to hope of gain. Lust burns itself 
out, but hope of gain has no limit. The hardest foe to 
conquer in Philippi was not the slave girl and her demon, 
but the owners moved by covetousness. Christ could 
cast out demons, but Judas was beyond even Christ's 
power. 

We could not justify Paul in trying to buy into the 
slave syndicate, neither could we justify him in passing 
the challenge unmet. Once the church profited by 
slavery, lottery, liquor-selling ; she has passed that point, 



HOPE OF GAINS 21 

her hardest task is before her, to break up syndicates of 
selfishness, to defy forces that have no motive but hope 
of gain. 

The noblest profession becomes a curse whfen pursued 
for hope of gain. The artist who paints for money as 
a motive loses his art. The doctor who ministers to 
suffering with the vision of money as the end loses his 
secret. The lawyer who sells himself in the market-place, 
and becomes a pilot for pirates, is soon classed with the 
company he keeps, and known by the master he serves. 
The preacher who serves for gold ranks with Aaron, not 
with Moses. 

The men who are in business for gain alone, who 
manipulate legislators for profit, awaken the suspicion 
and arouse the hatred of their fellows. It is better to 
have a loaf with peace than a stalled ox and hatred 
therewith. 

Pity the civilization that has no higher motive in this 
twentieth century of the Christian era than the motive 
of Philippi, the Macedonian motive that Paul crossed the 
sea to save Europe from. 

My brother, pray God to keep you from hope of 
gain as a motive, and give you passion for souls as a 
motive. Salvation by Christ means likeness to Christ, 
and Christ's master passion was love to God and for men. 



Ill 

CHRISTIAN USE OF MONEY 

" And all that believed were together, and had all things com- 
mon; and sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all 
men, as every man had need." — Acts 2 : 44, 45. 

Jesus Christ came into the world to fulfil prophecy, to 
save from sin, and to control life. The average Christian 
has learned only the first two-thirds of this proposition. 
The gospels abound in statements that " these things came 
to pass that prophecy might be fulfilled." The book of 
Hebrews is a long argument to show how Christ fulfilled 
the ritual of Judaism. Aaron was a priest from among 
men ; Christ was a priest after the power of an endless 
life. The high priest went into the Holy of Holies every 
year to cleanse the flesh. Christ went once to cleanse 
the soul from sin. The priest carried the blood of bulls ; 
Christ carried his own blood. 

We find all people looking for God. " God made of 
one every nation of men for to dwell on all the face of 
the earth . . . that they should seek God, if haply they 
might feel after him and find him. ,, In the Athenian 
streets was an altar dedicated to the unknown God, and 
Paul said to them, " Whom ye ignorantly worship, him 
declare I unto you." As we look into our own hearts 
we find the secret of the search, for every man carries 
in himself a passion for God, and every man's life is 
spent in a search for God. When we reach Christ the 
search ceases and the development of the soul begins 
along right lines. 
22 



CHRISTIAN USE OF MONEY 23 



Christ Redeems to Control 

So long as sermons are preached on man's need and 
Christ's satisfaction of that need, men applaud. Such 
preaching quickens the imagination, feeds the intellect, 
strengthens the will. But when a man passes from that 
to the control of life, and says that Jesus Christ saves 
that he may use, and redeems that he may control, and 
dies for that he may live in — then they say the preacher 
is meddlesome. But Christ came not only to save from 
sin but to control that which he has redeemed. Many 
years ago the Britons and the Boers made a treaty, and 
the Britons made a boundary and said to the Boers: 
" Beyond that you shall not go ; inside of that you may 
do as you please." Jesus Christ makes no Briton and 
Boer treaty with any redeemed soul. He assumes abso- 
lute control of your internal life. You are not only to 
do on the streets what he says, but to do in your homes 
what he commands. He has not left any of us private 
rights, " Ye are not your own ; ye are bought with a 
price, even the precious blood of Christ/ ' When I buy 
a chair that chair is mine, to sit on when I please, and to 
place where I choose. When I buy a man, where slavery 
holds, that man is mine. The man who is property, can- 
not own property. The man who is owned cannot own 
things. Paul says, " I seek not yours but you," knowing 
well that when I get you I get yours. When you buy the 
hoops that are around the barrel you buy the barrel ; for 
either without the other is useless. And no small part of 
the uselessness of Christianity today is that you give the 
hoops and keep the staves. 

The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman 
mixed in three measures of meal, until the whole was 
leavened. If you have ever watched leaven you have 



24 HONEST DEBTORS 

noticed that instantly a part of the meal becomes leavened 
it becomes a leavener and lifter and transformer; that 
is what it was leavened and lifted and transformed for, 
not that it may be lifted to a new life, but that it may 
use its life to a new purpose, and it touches all the parti- 
cles around it until all become leavened. I have some- 
times in eating cake come across a bit of hard flour, that 
was not moistened or sweetened or lifted. It had the 
benefit of the moisture and sweetness and uplifting all 
around it, but it was not lifted up or helped by these 
things ; it was simply a disgusting ball of hardness. Did 
you ever see a man like that ? When the world bites into 
such an one it says, " Faugh, hypocrite ! " 

The kingdom of heaven is like seed sown. The instant 
one particle of earth surrenders to the seed it lays hold 
on the next particle, and they are lifted into the life of 
the plant ; but the instant it stops doing that the life goes 
back again into the earth, and the plant dies. You see 
two trees, one on either side of the street; one is dead 
and the other alive. At a distance you cannot tell the 
difference, the trunk and the limbs and the bark are the 
same; but on examination you find that one is carrying 
no sap through its branches. It is dead. There is a 
great deal of dead wood in Christian churches, people 
having the form of godliness but not the power. They 
are knit into organizations, but have had no life for 
years; ministered to by the sun,, but they have nothing 
but dry rot in cell after cell. 

Christ's Work Determined by Yours 

When Christ came into the home in Cana of Galilee 
he regulated his actions by the people's actions, and acted 
according to what they would do. Mary understood him 
and she said, " Whatsoever he saith to you, do it." He 



CHRISTIAN USE OF MONEY 25 

turned the water into sparkling wine, but they set the 
limit of his power by what they did. He entered the 
house to be master, and every slave was subject to his 
will. Jesus Christ enters into your life to be its master. 
Your life will die out unless you are willing to obey the 
command, " Whatsoever he saith to you, do it." When 
Christ was in the boat he sat in the end of it and taught. 
When the people had scattered he pushed out and had the 
nets let down, and after he had filled the boat with fishes 
he bade the disciples who owned it leave it and become 
fishers of men. Christ fed the multitude with loaves and 
fishes, but afterward he said, " Except ye eat my flesh 
and drink my blood, ye cannot enter life " ; and to do 
that is to be transformed to his will. And when the 
people who had been filled with the loaves and fishes 
heard that, they turned and fled. Christianity as a con- 
venience is one thing; as a master, it is another. So 
long as Christ fed the people they gladly followed him, 
but when he said, " I will be master or nothing," they 
left him. Christ comes into the life to control it abso- 
lutely or to have nothing to do with it. 

These disciples had learned the lesson. Christ had 
been with them, then he had been crucified; God had 
raised him from the dead, Peter had preached that mar- 
velous sermon, Pentecost was past, and then came the 
absolute surrender of everything they owned. They 
" had everything in common." Can you have Christ in 
common and not have things in common ? Can you have 
salvation and not have a sharing of things in your life? 
Is salvation a Wagner car in which you have the right of 
way, or is it a highway to be shared with others? God 
pity you if you think salvation is separation from the 
world's burdens and cares, to wear a laurel wreath on a 
brow that is filled with selfish plannings. They emptied 
c 



26 HONEST DEBTORS 

out their money, they sold all they had, and laid every- 
thing at the feet of the apostles. The principle was then 
established and has never been repealed. I do not ask 
you because they did so to sell your property and turn the 
money in to the board of this church. The board of this 
church is not wise enough to accept the responsibility ; the 
apostles were. But that is not the principle. They 
showed their surrender to Christ by their surrender to 
the apostles. How do you show yours? You haven't 
made it, and how can you show it? When Christ comes 
into a man's life everything he has becomes Christ's for 
his service. 

Two Lives: Which? 

A baby is born down in the avenue. It seems for 
weeks to be nothing but an animated appetite, but it has 
five open doors through which impressions come — senses 
of taste, of touch, of sound, of smell, and of sight. This 
outer world pressing on the little life on every side opens 
the doors, and the impressions stream in, the soul wakens 
and the little child has an impression of light and dark- 
ness, of warmth and cold, of hunger and satisfaction, and 
out of these impressions it weaves a little web that we 
call thought, and the soul grows more and more, until 
from receiving impressions it begins to work out and 
make impressions. It begins to think itself, and so the 
little life grows up conscious that while it has the little 
body, yet the soul is not the body. The child thinks more 
profoundly on these questions than we think. It realizes 
first that there is a difference between the body and the 
soul, and it begins to reason from this. It asks strange, 
far-reaching questions which puzzle us to answer. A 
man is sleeping in a Wagner car. The porter wakens 
him and goes on. The man knows that while the porter 



CHRISTIAN USE OF MONEY 27 

wakens him he is not a part of him. So the world comes 
and wakens the child, and the child knows that it is not 
the world, although the world wakens it. By and by the 
train stops, and the man leaves the car. The man was 
neither the porter nor the car. The child is conscious 
that if at any time its soul should leave the train of life 
it would go to another station ; and so the children stretch 
out their hands to heaven, knowing that there is a differ- 
ence between body and soul. 

Now, to this growing child there are two lives possible. 
One, in which all the attention is given to the impressions 
that come to the body. There are men who lay the whole 
emphasis of life on the passions and appetites. That is 
what Paul meant when he said, " To be carnally minded 
is death." When a flagstaff is raised the flag is fastened 
at the top, just touching the staff, so that it may flow out 
freely in the morning breeze. But we have seen flags 
sometimes that refuse to catch the breeze; they wrap 
themselves tightly around the pole and hug it the more 
tightly the stronger the wind blows. And the wind blows 
them to tatters while they still hug the pole. A man's 
body is only meant as a flagstaff from which the mind 
may float out like a flag to the morning breeze. Yet I 
have seen minds which just hugged the pole all the time 
until they were wound round and round with appetites 
and passions and things, until they were whipped into 
rags and tossed into God's rag-bag for eternity. 

The other way of living is to lay the emphasis on 
thoughts, to use the mind as a flag and the body as a flag- 
staff. If you go down on the street-car you will find two 
kinds of people in it. There are the passengers, and the 
conductor and motorman. The passengers presently 
leave the car, but the conductor and motorman never 
leave the car; it is their world, their source of income, 



28 HONEST DEBTORS 

their point of contact with outside life. Some men use 
their bodies in this way; they never rise away from it. 
Others use it as the passengers use the car, as a con- 
venience and a conveyance. Keep your body under. 
Men were made to stand on their feet, not on their heads. 

The Secret of Greatness 

But now Christ comes and knocks at the door of 
your heart and demands entrance. He is ushered into 
the drawing-room and he is welcomed to the parlor. 
But is he going to stay there? He has brought a new 
thought of life, and he is not only going to control the 
body but the mind and will. He goes from room to 
room, from cellar to attic, from closet to closet, and 
demands the right to flood them all with his light and 
warm them with his warmth and redeem them with 
his presence. And God pity you if you have a room 
where he has not right of way. He goes to your 
library and kitchen and dining-room and demands 
them ; he comes to your safe and demands that. He 
has a right to it. " Ye are not your own," ye are 
bought with a price that covers everything you own. 
That is the principle that underlies the emptying out 
of things. When Christ comes to the life of a man 
who has been intemperate, if he does not turn the in- 
temperance out, you say he is not in the life. If he 
comes to a man who is sensual and does not turn 
that out, you say he is not in the life. But if he comes 
to a man who is covetous and does not turn the covet- 
ousness out, you say nothing. Jesus Christ came not 
only to redeem the body, but the mind; not only to 
the bar-room but to the business-house. 

When Christ enters into a life he enters into it to 
control it and lift it to a higher level and a diviner 



CHRISTIAN USE OF MONEY 29 

meaning. The students of Harvard asked Colonel 
Higginson the secret of greatness. He said : " Dedi- 
cate yourself to some great movement ; dedicate your- 
self to something that is so much higher than yourself 
that you forget yourself, and success will come." 
Christ is bigger than you. Have you got hold of him? 
If you take hold of him he is great enough to make 
you forget self, and when you forget self you will for- 
get everything else, and success will come. The world 
is to most of us a great plate-glass mirror in which 
we look at ourselves. When Christ comes he shatters 
that mirror. 

The close of the last century has brought to our 
view two great men. Inseparably connected with 
South Africa is the name of Cecil Rhodes. He was 
the youngest son of an English clergyman, and with 
the usual portion of a younger son. His father gave 
him a good education; that was all he gave him to 
start in life with. No man owes any more to his son. 
The oak tree when it packs the acorn with its own life, 
bids it make its own tree. I would American fathers 
were as wise. Let the boy make his own life. Give 
him an education and let him out, and do not wrap him 
up like a mummy in riches. When Rhodes was at 
Oxford studying he sat at the feet of Aristotle and 
learned this rule, " Find some great purpose that is 
large enough to justify you in using your best effort, 
and try to reach it." That is enough for any man. 
He went back to South Africa and thought and 
thought and thought : " What is large enough to 
justify my effort? Money? Oh, I have seen so many 
men accumulating things and then become so burdened 
with things that they lost the upward glance. Money 
is not worth it. Is the church worth it? Not as it is 



/ 



30 HONEST DEBTORS 

organized today," he decided. What then ? I can 
live for my country. He thought through the subject 
of religion. He was an evolutionist and a believer in 
Darwin, and he said : " I do not know whether there 
is any God or not, but there is a fifty per cent, chance 
that there is. I will throw myself on the positive side 
that there is." Some of you have one hundred per 
cent, of faith and have not thrown yourselves on that 
side. Then Cecil Rhodes said, " If there be a God he 
must reveal himself to men." And how ? " Through 
evolution, through the survival of the fittest. Then it 
will not be the black man or the red man or the brown 
man that will survive. It will be the white man." 
Then of the white races which is the fittest? The 
Anglo-Saxon, he decided. Then God is working 
through the Anglo-Saxon, and I will throw myself on 
the side of the Anglo-Saxon. " If I were God, what 
would I do with South Africa? I would paint it in 
British red." You and I may not agree with him in 
his interpretation of Providence ; but — oh for fifty men 
in Buffalo who would throw themselves into the breach 
for God whom they do believe in ! The men who threw 
in their money to the apostles did no more than did 
Cecil Rhodes. He accumulated an enormous fortune and 
became a multimillionaire, and he used every dollar of it 
for the betterment of humanity and the building up of 
the British Empire in South Africa. He considered him- 
self a trustee of the state; he belonged to the British 
Empire, body and soul. What we want to see in the 
church of Christ today is men and women who believe 
in Jesus Christ, who have given themselves entirely to 
Christ. 

The other man whom I would mention is Mr. Ford, 
of Boston. He started in life a poor man. For a time 



CHRISTIAN USE OF MONEY 31 

he taught in a Sunday school in Boston which Moody 
attended. He afterward became an editor, and for years 
was the editor and publisher of the " Youth's Com- 
panion/' He was very successful in business, and raised 
the circulation of " Youth's Companion " to many times 
what it had been ; but all through the years of his marvel- 
ous prosperity he sat at a little desk in a small room and 
worked for the glory of God. The one thought of his 
life was, "lama steward of Jesus Christ." He lived 
quietly and indulged in none of the appetites and passions 
that men say are so needful. Year after year, as the 
golden tide rolled in, he so arranged his business that 
when he died his money should revert as trust funds to 
Jesus Christ. For years he paid twenty thousand dollars 
a year into the running expenses of one church in Boston. 
He developed a great people's church, with its wonderful 
educational institutions, and paid out thousands to city 
missions ; and when he died at a ripe age, leaving a for- 
tune of twenty-five hundred thousand dollars, he be- 
queathed one hundred and fifty thousand dollars of it to 
his daughter while she lived, to revert to missions at her 
death, and all the rest to the cause of Christ. It is a 
comparatively easy matter, to give a quit-claim deed of 
one's property and leave the responsibility of spending 
it to others. But for a man to sit down deliberately to 
the drudgery of a long life, moving in a narrow circle, 
make thousands of dollars and give it all to God, this is 
the giving of self. If I never knew a name but his I 
should believe in the power of the gospel, for I have seen 
it worked out in a human life. 

A man stood for years as a paying teller of a great 
financial concern. He was led into temptation and drew 
out forty thousand dollars to spend in gambling hells. 
He is awaiting trial and punishment. Is he any worse 



32 HONEST DEBTORS 

than the Christian man who withdraws from Christ the 
bulk of his estate and spends it on his family? Think 
it through quietly. " Martha, Martha, thou art careful 
and troubled about many things. " But, Martha, you 
have no business with many things; one thing is need- 
ful — Jesus Christ. 



IV 

RELIGION AND BUSINESS 

" So that not only this our craft is in danger to be set at nought ; 
but also that the temple of the great goddess Diana should bie 
despised, and her magnificence should be destroyed, whom all 
Asia and the whole world worshipeth." — Acts 19 : 27. 

Ephesus was the third starting-point of Christianity. 
Christianity was born, cradled, and kindergartened in 
Jerusalem. The first preachers and converts were Jews. 
The first seeds were sown and the first harvest gathered 
in the field of Judaism. The Master commanded that 
his followers should go into all the world and preach the 
gospel to every creature, but the apostles settled down in 
Jerusalem. The divine purpose cannot be thwarted by 
human laziness; persecution compelled scattering of the 
seed. The stalk clings to the seed it has ripened, but the 
flail divorces seed from stalk, and the hand sows the 
divorced seed. " They that were scattered abroad went 
everywhere, preaching the word." 

Antioch became the next center. Gentile Christianity 
sprang up, and foreign missions followed. 

Where the Law Did Not Hold 

Ephesus is specially identified with John and his gospel 
of love. Tonight our study is of Ephesus and Paul. 
Ephesus was built on the Cayster River, a mile from the 
Icarian Sea ; it had one of the most commodious harbors 
on the Mediterranean. Through the city ran great roads 
north and south, commanding the commerce of the prov- 

33 



34 HONEST DEBTORS 

ince of Asia. Its population was very large and mixed, 
its markets the Vanity Fair of Asia. It was essentially a 
Greek city, though under Roman rule. Laws do not create 
character nor change temperaments. " The East is East, 
and the West is West." England rules India, but it is 
still India. Ephesus was a city of palaces and temples. 
The most wonderful building, and one of the wonders of 
the world, was the Temple of Diana. Destroyed by fire 
the night that Alexander was born, it was rebuilt, en- 
larged, and beautified. Men and women poured out 
money and jewelry without stint to build the most beauti- 
ful place of worship in the world. Its peristyle was of 
one hundred and twenty pillars of Parian marble hewn in 
Ionic architecture, its doors of carved cypress, the stair- 
case leading to the roof a single vine from Cyprus. The 
roof was supported by pillars of jasper set on bases of 
Parian marble. On these pillars hung votive offerings 
of priceless value. Within the walls were the master- 
pieces of Greek artists and sculptors. At the end of the 
room stood the great altar, adorned with the masterpiece 
of Praxiteles, behind this a purple curtain, and back of 
the curtain the image worshiped by all Asia. A rude figure 
of a woman, said to have fallen from heaven, the lower 
limbs swathed, the body covered with breasts, symboliz- 
ing the fertility of Nature. Life was worshiped, and out 
of the worship grew a horrible cult of sensuality. When 
the temple was completed Mithridates stood on the roof 
and shot an arrow, saying the distance should be the 
radius of a circle within which all should be safe from 
law. The arrow sped a furlong; a circle of a furlong 
radius was sacred to crime and sensuality. This bit of 
ground became a moral bog, breeding disease and death. 
The priestesses were prostitutes, the temple the center of 
the red light district. 



RELIGION AND BUSINESS 35 

The passions we fight, Diana worship emphasized. 
Diana, under another name, rules the worship of India, 
and yet some men say, " Why send the gospel to the 
heathen ? " Business waits upon religion. Christianity 
is the needle, commerce the thread following it into the 
web of life. The missionary saves a man and makes a 
market; he saves a soul, and the saved soul calls for 
clothing for the body, and business follows. The mis- 
sionary lives in a house, the convert leaves his hut for a 
house, and business prospers. Business follows the mis- 
sionary as the harvest follows the seedtime. The mis- 
sionary reduces the spoken to a written language, opens 
the mind of the heathen, and business makes books. 
Every form of religion breeds business. The worshiper 
of Diana must have an image of his god, and Demetrius 
goes into business. Business capitalizes emotion, senti- 
ment, taste. 

A man came into Ephesus preaching a new religion. 
God is spirit. His Son has become flesh, was crucified, 
rose again. The Holy Spirit has been given. Faith in 
the Son of God saves from sin. If God is spirit, then 
men do not need images. If salvation from sin comes 
through faith, then men do not need images. 

When Business Men Thought Religion Meddling 

So long as Paul was content to lead men out of half- 
light into full light no one complained, for the disciples 
of John were not buyers of images. So long as he was 
content to heal the bodies of men, no one complained, 
for health is good under any form of faith, bodily heal- 
ing did not interfere with business in images. So long 
as the preacher meddled only with the book business, 
image-makers were not troubled. Turned from black 
letters, some might buy images. Men in one kind of 



36 HONEST DEBTORS 

business are not specially troubled when sales are slow 
in another trade. A man in the book business is not 
disturbed when steel is sluggish, nor the steel man when 
leather is slow. Demetrius did not move till his craft 
was in danger. When " our craft is in danger " we act. 
A man may preach " God is spirit " for years and no 
maker of shrines will stir, but when he says, " They be 
no gods made with hands/' and people begin to believe 
it, the time has come for men of the class of Demetrius 
to move against the preacher. 

Daniel Webster spent years in the Senate defending 
the Constitution when it needed amendment, not defense ; 
as a pilot he was skilful in guiding the ship of state, but 
it was a slave-ship still ; he made and kept many friends. 
Charles Sumner went as Senator from the same State, 
but he had a Puritan conscience, he appealed to the law 
that hath her seat in the bosom of God, demanded free- 
dom for all beneath the flag; the answer was a caning 
that nearly cost him his life. Slavery, the Diana of 
those days, was in danger, and the apostle of the peril 
was answered with a club. 

Paul had changed the mind of Asia. Changed minds 
mean changed markets; down with the man who makes 
the change! It is an old story, a struggle as old as 
history. Business and religion are after the same man ; 
so long as we can compromise and each get a share, no 
one complains, but when either takes the whole invest- 
ment the struggle begins. But for the birthright Jacob 
and Esau might have continued friends. So long as 
Aaron taught religion and the slaves worked, Pharaoh 
was tolerant; but when Moses demanded the right to 
lead the people aside to worship, suspending work, 
Pharaoh replied that the people were lazy, and added 
to the toil. Another demand was met by an added 



RELIGION AND BUSINESS 37 

burden. " Make the same number of bricks, and spend 
part of the time gathering straw." 

Herod enjoyed John's sermons, and tried to do many 
things as the prophet directed. But Herodias was after 
the same man; he was her investment, she clipped her 
coupons from him. Like many an evil woman in cities 
today, she profited by a man's passion. The struggle 
was on between John and Herodias, and she won. 
Felix and Drusilla sat on the same throne. Paul strug- 
gled for the soul of Felix, but Drusilla won it. If Paul 
had won, Drusilla would have lost the throne. Christ's 
trouble dated from the day he drove business from the 
Temple. The religious leaders had turned the house 
of prayer into a den of thieves, and Christ cleansed it, 
but the task emptied the pockets of the investors. The 
South rebelled because property was in danger ; if slavery 
had not paid, morals would have been easier and emanci- 
pation cost less. 

Business supports religion, builds her churches, pays 
her bills ; let her keep to her own side of the road. But 
business methods spring up that wrong men, and religion 
must resist or lose all she is after, not money, but men. 
Two nines are after the same pennant on the field of 
struggle; they do not dare face each other without an 
umpire, for hot blood easily prompts to violence. The 
eleven on the gridiron dare not begin the struggle with- 
out an umpire ; the struggle for men is much more real, 
and when methods destroy men the church must protest. 
In hunting whales the man in the topmast has the wider 
vision ; if you will not launch out when he shouts, " There 
she blows," then why send him aloft? Ofttimes it is 
clear aloft when fog shuts out the vision on deck. The 
man aloft, thinking only of men, has a clearer vision 
than the man on the deck thinking also of money. The 



38 HONEST DEBTORS 

man steering may not understand the machinery below 
as well as the engineer does, but he sees what the ma- 
chinery manager cannot see, the compass and the ocean. 
Paul was a better judge of men's needs than Demetrius 
was, though not so good a maker of shrines, but men 
and not shrines are the main thing in life. 
Business may be divided into four classes : 

Classes of Business 

I. The method good, and the product also good. 
This is ideal business, and many pursue it. They are 
big enough to do right and prosper. The output helps, 
and the method of making does not hurt. 

II. The method bad, and the output good. What men 
buy from the mill helps life, but the making ruins life. 
Rubber is needful in modern civilization, but the way of 
getting rubber is a blot on civilization. If our scent 
were keener we could smell the blood and sweat and be 
sickened. Better to walk than to ride on automobile 
tires that cost life; better let the building burn than 
quench the fire through hose that cost life. Better to 
go to bed at dusk than to light lamps with phosphorus 
matches that ruin the makers. 

III. The methods good, but the output bad. The 
methods of the brewery and distillery may be good, with 
model buildings, sanitary surroundings, but the output is 
destructive to man and civilization; the church must 
fight. 

IV. The methods bad, and the output bad. Then all 
decent men agree that a change is needful. 

The first class is commendable. The last must be 
destroyed. The second and third changed in so far as 
method or output hurts men. 



RELIGION AND BUSINESS 39 

In harmony, in heavenly harmony this universal frame began, 
From harmony to harmony through all the compass of the 

notes it ran, 
The diapason closing full in man. 

And anything that brings discord and spoils the full 
diapason must be regulated. The Creator ended his 
work with man. His Son came to redeem man; the 
church has only one task, to begin and end with man. 
Begin with man a sinner and end with man a saint, and 
all that meddles with her task must be meddled with. 

Where Religion Must Interfere 

David didn't touch the lion till it touched the lamb, 
then he could do one of two things — run or fight. A 
hireling would have run, " the good shepherd lays down 
his life for the sheep." When both lion and shepherd 
are after the same sheep the struggle is inevitable. " And 
let it come, I repeat it, sir, let it come." 

Bricks were essential to Egyptian civilization; but for 
bricks Joseph could not have stored wheat and saved 
Egypt; but when the making of bricks enslaved the 
descendants of the men Joseph saved, it was time for 
Moses to struggle. 

The church has something else to do than to darn 
the worn lives spoiled by the feet of business eagerness. 
If salve will heal, then salve the sore; but if a knife is 
needed, then use the knife. Some men can walk a tight 
rope looking up, all cannot; and it is the business of 
men who care for pilgrims to build a bridge so broad 
that the weak can cross the stream safely. If it is better 
for a man never to have been born than to cause one 
child to stumble, then the church can be in no better 
business than in removing stumbling-stones on the high- 
way of civilization. " Prepare ye the way of the Lord, 



40 HONEST DEBTORS 

make his paths straight," though the making cuts into 
some estates of men. 

A strike raged in Westmoreland County, Pa., for 
months. Men had been shot, stoned, bruised, mangled, 
as men are when strikes stir up strife. The superinten- 
dent of the mine thought the Slavic priest was meddling, 
so he wrote him a letter in which he said : 

I will, therefore, ask you to drop everything concerning your 
church organization until you have advice from me. 

I shall insist on your carrying out these instructions and trust 
that we will have no further derogatory information. I hope you 
will acknowledge receipt of this letter, with a promise to carry 
out my instructions. 

Thanking you in advance, I am, 

Yours truly, 



Another letter followed in a few days complaining 
that no answer had been received and no promise to 
carry out instructions. The priest replied through the 
papers, saying that he had been neutral up to the time 
he received the letters, they called his attention to cer- 
tain facts, and he must defend the men; saying further 
that he was not the priest of or for any company, but a 
priest of the Roman Catholic Church and for the people 
who constituted the congregation, and that he would not 
accept advice nor carry out any instructions of any com- 
pany nor its officials. He was afterward arrested and 
fined for trespass because he visited one of his members 
living in a house belonging to the company. 

Without passing judgment on the facts at all, we are 
confronted with a condition that calls for serious thought. 
" How much better is a man than a sheep," or even a 
coal-mine ! 

If seven-days-in-a-week toil unfits men for manhood, 



RELIGION AND BUSINESS 41 

then the church, organized to save men, must try to 
save men from toil that spoils men. If late hours on 
Saturday night kill the Sabbath, even though the shops 
and stores be owned and run by Christians and the 
church share in the profits, if the custom hurts men the 
church must speak. In making men the church must 
meddle with what unmakes men; in saving men, with 
what spoils men. 

Russia's prophet has gone to his reward, dying out- 
side the Greek Church because he dared to prophesy 
for men. The legend of Alexander I was the turning- 
point in his life. The legend runs that Alexander left 
the throne because he saw what it rested on, and what 
it cost in human life and comfort to sustain it. One 
day he saw a soldier condemned for visiting his dying 
father, condemned to eight thousand blows; four thou- 
sand killed him, and Alexander, making himself known 
to the doctor, put his clothes on the murdered man, 
sent the body to the palace; the funeral of Alexander 
followed, and the living man put on the dead soldier's 
uniform, took the remaining blows, and died in Siberia. 
Tolstoy stepped out of his comfortable home, took the 
peasant's share, suffered where he could not modify the 
cause of suffering, and like his Master, died without 
the walls. 

Across the centuries comes the challenge of the Christ : 
"If any man will be my disciple, let him deny himself, 
take up his cross daily, and follow me." That following 
will lead to surrendering everything that he may save 
men. God's great gift is life through Christ, the accep- 
tance of that life means giving it the right of way in all 
relations and duties. It is better not to have been born 
than to follow Christ to capitalize him and turn the 
knowledge of his secrets into pieces of silver. 

D 



V 
THE HOLY SPIRIT 

" And John bare record, saying, I saw the Spirit descending from 
heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him. And I knew him not; 
but he that sent me to baptize with water, the same said unto me : 
Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending and remaining 
on him, the same is he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost. And 
I saw, and bare record that this is the Son of God." — John 1 : 
32-34. 

Knowledge comes to the many through the few. A man 
especially fitted by temperament, training, and opportunity 
discovers a great truth that is hidden from his fellows. 
He shares the truth with others, and it is added to the 
common wealth. The miser with money is mean enough, 
but the miser with truth is meaner still. The miser with 
money may keep his gold; but he who is miserly with 
truth finds it decaying on his hands, just as neglected soil 
finds itself burdened with decaying vegetable, and a man 
who will not share his Christian life is cursed by it — it 
spoils upon him and he is spoiled by it. The magnetic 
needle has discovered the magnetic current ; it shares its 
discovery with the great ocean liner, and every steamer 
on the ocean is governed by this discovery. Columbus 
tries to find a new way to the old world across the ocean, 
and he comes upon a new world. He returns to tell of 
his discovery. Millions come across the sea, following 
the thread of his discovery ; other millions stay at home in 
the old world, but those who doubt the existence of the 
new world are benefited by the discovery, for the new 
42 



THE HOLY SPIRIT 43 

world nourishes the old and keeps it from starving; it 
ministers to it in a thousand ways and keeps it strong and 
young. Stephenson discovers the locomotive-engine and 
the nations become his passengers. Fulton discovers the 
steamboat, and the ocean is spanned in a few days. 
Franklin finds the lightning, and it becomes his messen- 
ger, the world's errand-boy, to flash by wire and wireless, 
across continents and seas, the communications of thought 
and of desire. 

Suppose the magnetic needle had refused to share its 
secret, that Fulton had died with his secret, and that 
Franklin had perished before announcing his discovery, 
what a different world this would have been ! And it is 
only as men are willing to share the truth that the world 
is filled with light. 

The Discovery of God 

A man is born in a hut beside a rolling river. He finds 
that the river means life, and he builds an altar to it and 
worships there. His son also builds beside it. The son 
journeys; farther on he finds other rivers and builds other 
altars, until he comes to the mother of all rivers, and an 
altar is built by the ocean, and he worships it. To each of 
these he gives a different name. He goes back to the nar- 
row worship by the side of the single stream, but he is 
never again the same; his thoughts go out to the larger 
sea. That is the history of religion. A nation has a tri- 
bal name for God, and men think if they leave their home 
they must leave their God behind them. But as they 
travel they find that other men have other gods, and that 
all tribal worship turns to one God. Finally, Abraham 
is able to discover that there is one God over all. He 
worships him and becomes the father of the faithful. 
And now this belief is wrought into the fiber of the na- 



44 HONEST DEBTORS 

tion. " The Lord our God is one God." It is a wonder- 
ful discovery, that all the forces of the universe center in 
one great life ; and the people hold this belief generation 
after generation, until a prophet stands upon the banks of 
the Jordan and makes a new discovery: that God is a 
Father, that he has a Son. It is a wonderful discovery. 
Men have discovered the north star, and it has been a 
means of safety to millions. But some one found that the 
north star is double; it has two stars, but they shine as 
one for us. The astronomers learned of this, for knowl- 
edge comes from one to many, and they brought their in- 
struments to bear and studied night after night, and be- 
hold ! it is a triple star. Instead of two there are three 
stars, which whirl around each other. And yet they are 
one through all the centuries. John, standing by the Jor- 
dan, saw that God is one, but there is the Father and the 
Son. These two are one, yet before the worlds were 
made, before the stars were spoken into being, before God 
breathed life into the ground, he had a Son. And the Son 
was in the bosom of the Father, and the filial relation 
between these two is complete and perfect. The human 
family is but a faint, far shadow of the divine. " Like as 
a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that 
fear him." God is the only real, eternal Father in the 
universe, and you and I have but faint far shadows of 
God in relation to his eternally begotten Son. We find 
that the old world and the new are one. This continent 
on this side the sea and the other so far away on the 
other side are one. Go to the bottom of the sea, and you 
will find them knit together by masses of rock. So God 
comes to us as the Father and God as the Son, and be- 
tween the two runs the tide of human thought; but drop 
the plummet down, and you will find that the two are 
one. There are millions of people who never heard this 



THE HOLY SPIRIT 45 

truth, yet the life of the Christian church is built on this 
truth, and the islands of the sea would not be what they 
are today were it not for this tremendous truth. Suppose 
John had been as doubtful about his truth as you are 
about yours, the world today would be Jewish. Man is 
under divine obligation to tell the truth; else he would 
not have been born. 

Christ the Discoverer of the Holy Spirit 

But Christ himself is a discoverer, and he discovered 
the Holy Spirit. And thus we have the triune God. 
" Upon whom the Spirit shall descend and abide, he is 
the Son." " And I will send you another Comforter, and 
he shall guide you into all truth." Christ's discovery is 
shown to us first of all in his mode of living. Before 
this time holy men spake as they were caught up and 
moved by the Holy Spirit, but there was no discovery of 
the Holy Spirit. Just as at the World's Fair there was a 
great Ferris wheel on which you could be lifted to a tre- 
mendous height. The majority of the people lived on the 
level of the earth, but now and then one went on the 
wheel and was lifted for a vision. They spoke, but did 
not live, as they were moved by it. It was only a tuning 
of the great orchestra that should fill the universe with 
divine harmony. Christ came that he might show the 
Father, but his gift to the world was the Holy Spirit, and 
this he has poured out upon us. For weeks men have 
been working on Utica Street laying car-tracks ; the other 
day I heard a car swinging by. A friend comes to my 
house, and when he is going away I tell him to take a 
car. The car is what is in my mind, but what is the car ? 
It is a revealing of a terrific electric force, and it is 
driven by the force which it reveals. Go into the car- 
shop and you will find that every part of the car is built 



46 HONEST DEBTORS 

to manifest the electric current. Jesus Christ came to 
manifest the Holy Ghost. He said, " I will send you 
another Comforter, and he shall guide you into all truth." 
" Remember Lot's wife." Why? Because she died look- 
ing over her shoulder. The average Christian lives think- 
ing of a dying Christ on Calvary. The living Christ has 
given you the Holy Ghost. The average Christian stands 
with John and thinks of the Father and Son, but God 
has poured out the Holy Ghost which gave him power 
and force. Have you received the baptism of the Holy 
Ghost ? Have you been baptized by fire ? Apollos was a 
man mighty in the Scripture, and yet he led converts by 
the score who had never heard of the Holy Ghost. It 
was the discovery of the Holy Ghost abiding in a man, 
moving him, and showing in all his outer activities, which 
Christ exhibited. You have seen the Brooklyn Bridge, 
and as you have looked at it you have seen passengers 
walking along it, and then there is a broad way for 
horses, and then there is a cable line, and then the trolley 
bed where the power comes from above. There is the 
weary pilgrimage on the footpath, there is a glimmer of 
divine truth in the broader way; there is the grip cable- 
car where you get some of the energy, and you are heated 
by coal burning in stoves; then comes the Holy Ghost 
light, where a man is filled with the divine current, where 
the power of his being is the Holy Ghost dwelling in him. 
Jesus Christ came to reveal that force and light. Have 
you learned it? Do you know it? Is the light of your 
life Holy Ghost light? Is the warmth of your heart 
Holy Ghost warmth, and your power Holy Ghost power ? 
The first man was of the earth, earthy; the second man 
was of the Spirit, divine. The first man can bestow noth- 
ing but what God gave him; the second can bestow all 
that God gave him. 



THE HOLY SPIRIT 47 

The Christian a Man Plus God 

The second man starts a new civilization. We hear a 
great deal about evolution. Jesus Christ was never 
evolved from the old Adam. " Ye must be born again, or 
ye cannot see the kingdom of God." You go into a hot- 
house and you see a bewildering mass of beauty. It is 
the season of chrysanthemums. The gardener talks to 
you about the evolution of the chrysanthemum. He says 
it started as a little daisy, and from it was evolved this 
beautiful flower. Evolved ? It was transferred to a hot- 
house built by a man, the flower tended by a man. Then 
the chrysanthemum is a daisy plus a man. Remove the 
flower from the hothouse and the heat and the soil, take 
away all the human element, and in ten years you will 
have a daisy. The chrysanthemum is a daisy plus a man, 
and the Christian is a man plus God. They talk to me of 
the evolution of the locomotive. They show me this 
strange little rattletrap which Stephenson evolved out of 
his brain ; and then they show me the splendid machine of 
today, and say this was evolved from that little rattletrap. 
It is not the evolution of the first machine, but a succes- 
sion of human thoughts which have evolved into this 
splendid locomotive. It is steel and steam plus the hu- 
man mind that made the locomotive. The evolution of 
the man into the Christ life is a human being charged 
and controlled by the Holy Ghost, and the great discovery 
that Christ gave to you and to me is that it is possible 
for man to be the temple for the Holy Ghost, to find the 
motive of activity and power in action in spiritual forces. 

Sons of God by the Holy Spirit 

I have been interested in Doctor Cook's account of a 
search for the South pole. He tells about their entry 



48 HONEST DEBTORS 

into the Southern seas, and how they crowded themselves 
in between the ice-floes, and that for thirteen months they 
were absolutely surrendered to the ice-floes, which sur- 
rounded them for two thousand miles. That is what 
Jesus Christ did with the Holy Ghost from the baptism to 
the resurrection. He did not try to make terms with the 
Spirit, he was driven by the Spirit. He thought and 
spoke in terms of the Spirit. He surrendered himself 
to the Holy Spirit, and lived a life entirely surrendered 
to him. I could today show you thousands of men in 
Ladysmith who have surrendered themselves absolutely 
to a British commander. If those men can surrender 
themselves to a commander, you can surrender yourself 
to God. It is theirs but to do and die, and as I can use 
my fingers to do whatever my thoughts command, so a 
commander can use those men to do what he pleases. Just 
so was the absolute surrender of Jesus Christ to the Holy 
Ghost. He upon whom the Holy Ghost shall abide, he 
is the Son of God. And he says he has power to make 
all children of God who believe in him. It is a new type 
of life. Some of you who have lived in Buflfalo for years 
can remember the horse-cars which were drawn along our 
streets by horses, lighted by oil-lamps and heated by 
stoves. Then came the electric-cars, and the streets were 
surrendered to the new power. The old cars were taken 
away, and today we have a new car which can shoot 
along like a thunderbolt. It requires a new roadbed and 
a new plant and a new force to be a Christian. Jesus 
Christ shared his revelation of the Holy Spirit with 
men. From the day of Pentecost he poured out the 
Spirit on all men. Why do not all men receive him? 
Why is not your life a Holy Ghost life? Why do you 
shrink from personal service ? 
A Christian life is divine. When Jesus Christ lived in 



THE HOLY SPIRIT 49 

the flesh he gave power to all to live in the flesh. If you 
want to know how to live that kind of life, shut your eyes 
to all other literature and study Christ for a while. He 
shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with power. 
How did John study him? He stood on the bank of the 
Jordan waiting, and men wanting to be baptized came to 
him one by one and surrendered themselves to him. 
John buried them in the rushing current, and they were 
baptized to repentance. Surrender yourself to him, and 
without resistance, without straining, without gasping, as 
a child placed by its mother in its crib. Surrender your- 
self to the Son of God, and he will baptize you in and 
bury you under, and fill you with the Holy Ghost. It was 
a marvelous discovery that Abraham made; it is a won- 
derful discovery that John made; and it is a marvelous 
discovery that Christ made, that there is a Spirit, and 
that men like you and me can be filled with the Holy 
Ghost. 

The Department of Agriculture is making a curious 
series of experiments. We are told that different wines 
have different flavors, and now they find that these dif- 
ferent flavors are caused not by the different kinds of 
grapes, but by the different kinds of yeasts, and in a cer- 
tain part of Spain the air is filled with a peculiar kind of 
drifting life, and these fungi are plucked with the grapes 
and crushed with them, and then they begin their life. 
This little form works away, and the result is that the 
best of sherry comes out in its perfection. In France 
there is another fungus which gives champagne, and 
others which give other flavors of wine. And so the rea- 
son why one wine is better than another is not in the 
quality of the grapes, but in the fungus growths. Some 
of these fungi have been imported to America and used 
in American cider, and in it they work until you cannot 



50 HONEST DEBTORS 

tell the difference between it and the genuine imported 
wine. And the different fungi give the different kinds 
of wine. " The kingdom of heaven is like leaven/' and 
when the Holy Ghost comes into the sour cider of your 
life he brings you out such pure wine. Christ gave the 
Holy Ghost to you and to me. It is a marvelous gift. 

My brother, my sister, have you been baptized into the 
Holy Ghost? Is the Holy Spirit the mainspring of your 
life, the inspiration of your thought, the warmth of your 
religious life ? " Except ye be born of the Spirit, ye shall 
never see the kingdom of God." 



VI 

THE SPIRIT'S BIRTHDAY 

" And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all 
with one accord in one place. . . And there rested upon each of 
them cloven tongues as of fire. . . Every man heard them speak in 
his own tongue. . . We do hear them speak in our tongue the 
wonderful works of God." — Acts 2 : 1, 6, 11. 

Every Christian has two birthdays. He has many anni- 
versaries, but two birthdays: the first, natural; the 
second, spiritual. " That which is born of the flesh is 
flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit." 
Through the natural or fleshy birth we enter into de- 
pendent human relations with the family, with the neigh- 
borhood, with the state, with the race. And we must 
recognize this relationship. No man can develop his 
character who shrinks from duty. No one can be a good 
boy and a bad son, a good girl and a bad daughter, a 
good man and a bad father, a good woman and a bad 
mother, a good man and a bad neighbor, a good man and 
a bad citizen. Character is developed by meeting the 
obligations that come with relations. A man is born into 
a set of relations, and when he fulfills every obligation 
his character rounds out and he becomes a good man. A 
man is not a whole man because he has a good pair of 
eyes but is stone-deaf, nor because he has good ears and 
is stone-blind, nor yet having both sight and hearing, 
when he is a cripple; neither is a man a good man who 
shrinks from the obligations that come to him as father, 
as neighbor, or as citizen. 

51 



52 HONEST DEBTORS 

The Organizer of Visible Christianity 

By the spiritual birth we are born into dependent 
spiritual relations with God. No man can be a good 
Christian and shirk his obligations to God, or not to be 
organized into the visible church of Christ. This outside 
Christianity is like peddling vegetables in a cart from 
door to door. You may get a living out of it, but one 
day's neglect of it means bankruptcy. Civilization is 
made by men who are built into it, who pay their taxes 
and do their duty. The tree grows up and rises into view 
out of the earth, taking with it some of the earth, which 
becomes a part of the tree. But the earth cannot be both 
dirt and tree ; it must be organized into the tree, or else 
remain simply earth. When the Spirit of the living God 
lays hold of man it organizes him into visible Christianity. 
If you are not organized into visible Christianity you are 
resisting the Spirit. To stay outside the visible church 
is to put yourself in opposition to the Spirit of the living 
God. He works through organization. An unorganized 
Christian is just as useless as a ghost without a body, or 
as steam without a boiler or engine. If you are too large 
to be organized into a church you amount to nothing 
except when looking at yourself in the mirror and admir- 
ing yourself. Life makes organization, depends upon 
organization. You never saw life outside of organiza- 
tion. There was organization at Pentecost, and the way 
the Spirit worked at Pentecost was the way he has worked 
all through the centuries. 

The Christian year has two birthdays in the calendar : 
The first is the day of the birth of Christ, and the second 
that of the Holy Spirit. The anniversary of the birth 
of Christ comes on Christmas, that of the Holy Spirit, 
Whitsunday. The great ecclesiastical organizations have 



THE SPIRITS BIRTHDAY 53 

recognized Whitsunday more than Christmas ; the Puri- 
tans would not recognize either; but Christians of today 
put the emphasis upon Christmas, and few of us know 
what Whitsunday means. Yet it is the anniversary of the 
birth of the Christian church. It is to the church what 
Pentecost was to the Jews. We have forgotten the birth- 
day in the centuries of the institution that was born. 

When we say that Jesus Christ was born in the flesh 
we do not say that it was the beginning of his existence ; 
it was the beginning of his life in the flesh. " In the 
beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, 
and the Word was God; the same was in the beginning 
with God." The birth of Christ in Bethlehem was not 
the beginning of the Christ life, but the manifestation of 
the Christ life in the flesh. It was the birth of God in 
the Son of man ; it was the contact of God with flesh, with 
human nature. Whitsunday was not the beginning of 
the Spirit's life, but the beginning of his mission in work- 
ing redemption to humanity. " The Spirit was with God, 
and was God." The Spirit was at first like a bird brood- 
ing over the black chaos, and the universe of order was 
brought out of this black chaos by the presence of the 
Holy Spirit. Ever since the beginning of the world the 
Spirit had touched men as the rising sun touches the 
mountain peaks; but since Pentecost he was poured out 
upon men, he is given to all men, and as Christmas is 
the anniversary of Christ's birth, Whitsunday, the an- 
niversary of Pentecost, is that of the Spirit. Before this 
time the Spirit worked from outside inward, now he 
works from the inside outward, and just as the Holy 
Spirit in Genesis is depicted as ruling over chaos, so now 
he rules over all humanity in the spiritual universe, and 
now through him the spiritual universe is to embody the 
life of God. 



54 HONEST DEBTORS 



The Revealer of Christ's Work 

The Holy Spirit could not come until Christ's work 
was finished. When Christ had finished his work the 
Spirit came to reveal that work. You who attended the 
World's Fair will remember that in the southwest corner 
of the Manufactures Building was a splendid electric 
light. Out from it flowed a stream of splendor. At first 
there was nothing to be seen but the light, but soon a 
man standing close to the light slipped into the frame 
a picture, and then the light showed not itself, but the 
picture. When the picture was taken away again the 
light showed in the frame nothing but itself. If the Holy 
Spirit had come out upon humanity before Christ's work 
was finished he would simply have revealed himself as 
light; but coming after Christ's work was finished he 
revealed the finished work of Jesus Christ, and the heart 
of redeemed humanity is the great wall on which the 
Spirit paints the Son of God. When the light was turned 
off the vision vanished; when the light was turned on 
again the vision returned. When the Spirit leaves a man 
Christ becomes unreal, prayer becomes unmeaning, the 
Bible becomes simply a book of history. When the Spirit 
returns Christ becomes the great reality of the Christian's 
consciousness, prayer becomes the great force of his life, 
and the Bible the great book of the centuries. " No man 
calleth Jesus Lord, save by the Spirit of God," and when 
a man stumbles over Christ he simply shows that the 
Spirit of God has not touched his inner life yet, and 
when a Christian grows cold in Christ's service and the 
vision of Christ fades away, he simply stands there as a 
living argument that he has ceased to be spiritually 
minded. He has become carnally minded, which is death. 
Just as you could not see the picture without the light, 



THE SPIRITS BIRTHDAY 55 

no more can men see Christ without the Spirit. Spiritual 
things are spiritually discerned, and Jesus Christ is a 
spiritual thing. Jesus Christ's work is a spiritual work, 
and men can have no knowledge of it until they are born 
of the Spirit. Christ says, " It is my meat to do God's 
will," and " The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up," 
" Thy will, not mine, be done." And so it is in obedience 
to the will of Christ that the Holy Spirit came to mani- 
fest Christ, and not to reveal himself. If Christ is be- 
coming more and more real to you, if the finished work 
is becoming more clear to your apprehension, if prayer 
is a force in your life, it is proof that the Holy Ghost is 
doing a work in you. 

The Quickener of Life 

When Christ wrought his miracles he never made a 
man. There is a story that Christ one day when a boy 
took some earth and out of it made birds, which leaving 
his hands mounted and flew toward the sun. That is tradi- 
tion, not truth. So far as we know, Christ did not create 
anything. He did not make eyes for the blind or ears 
for the deaf, but he restored God's thought. He gave 
power to see to the eyes that were already there, and 
power to hear to the ears that were there, and life to the 
dead man that was there. When Christ appeared at the 
grave of Lazarus there was life at one side of the stone 
and death at the other. He spoke and shot one ray of 
life into the tomb and there was life there. He did not 
make a new man. It was the same man that came forth. 
He had eyes and ears and stomach and brains and heart, 
but he could not use them. He was out of relation to the 
air and sun, and when Christ called back the life that had 
gone out of him, he was put into relation to these things. 
So it was the same brother whom they had buried that 



56 HONEST DEBTORS 

Mary and Martha led back to their home. When the 
Holy Ghost takes hold of a man he does not make a new 
man. Here is a man who has physical life in perfection, 
but he is not in relation with the Holy Ghost. The Holy 
Ghost takes hold of him and quickens all this life, and 
the man sees God and Christ and comes into the kingdom 
of righteousness. I recently read of a boy who was 
brought to an institution for the care of idiots. The 
boy was a cripple, had never stood upon his feet, nor 
seen the light of day, nor heard his mother's voice, but 
clothed in a wrapper he lay upon the floor day and night. 
He had simply power to consume food and build up a 
body; yet he had brains and heart and eyes and ears. 
The man in charge began his work on this boy. He said, 
" The first lesson I learned was that I must get down to 
him." Oh, you Christian folk on the heights of re- 
spectability ! do not you know that if you are going to 
save men you have got to get down where men are? 
This man was in a home and heard a boy refuse to obey 
his mother, who was upstairs. She did not shout over the 
balustrade to him, but going down to him and laying her 
hand upon his shoulder she said, " Jack, that is wrong," 
and the boy burst into tears. She might have screamed 
herself hoarse from where she was, without having any 
effect upon the boy. From this incident the man learned 
his lesson. He lay down upon the floor on a level with 
the child, getting as low as he could physically. In this 
position he read from a book day by day for three 
months, then he sat up in a chair, and the thing stirred. 
It had begun to live. The life that he had poured into 
it was quickening the powers that were there. He said, 
" Do you want me to read again ? " and the thing 
grunted a " Yes." Down to it again he went and read an 
hour a day until the thing turned to him and laid its 



THE SPIRITS BIRTHDAY 57 

finger on its lips. So he went on from step to step until 
one day he found this thing was beginning to find its 
hands and limbs, and he bade it creep, and as each foot 
moved he said, " That is right, that is right " ; and one 
day he saw it move its hand, and it said, " That is right, 
that is right, that is right." The thing was getting hu- 
manized. He worked patiently on. One day he brought 
it a pair of shoes and said, " Shoes," and the thing said, 
"Shoes." He said, "Who made the shoes?" "I don't 
know." He said, " The shoemaker," and the boy said, 
" Shoemaker." Then he brought him some bread, and 
said, " What is that? " " Don't know." " Bread." And 
the boy said, "Bread." "Who made the bread?" 
" Don't know." " Betsy." And the boy said, " Betsy." 
One day he led him up to where he could see the rising 
sun, and said, " What is that? " " Don't know." " It is 
the sun." And the boy said, " Sun." " Who made it? " 
" Don't know." " God." And the boy said, " God." A 
day or two after he saw this boy pointing out to another 
boy the sun, and saying, " That is the sun, and God made 
it." And he said it was worth all the weary months of 
work to get that boy to say that God made the sun. One 
day the boy's mother came, bringing a new coat for her 
boy. The boy looked into her face and she looked into 
his face and said, " You are my son," and the boy reached 
out his arms and said, " Mother." He was a boy now. 
Yet the doctor had put no ears or eyes or brains or heart 
into him. He had simply poured his life into him, and 
the waiting machinery started. It is a wonderful illus- 
tration of the work which the Holy Ghost has done in you 
and me. " You hath he quickened who were dead in tres- 
passes and sins." He pours himself into our heart and 
brains and teaches us to say, " Abba, Father," and " His 
Spirit bears witness with our Spirit that we are children 

£ 



58 HONEST DEBTORS 

of God." u Heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ." 
That is the work of the Holy Ghost. He was born into 
that work at Pentecost, and he has been carrying on this 
work for eighteen hundred years. God pity that man 
who goes to his grave untouched by the Holy Ghost. He 
shall never see the King in his beauty. 

The Witness to Christ 

The Holy Spirit bringing this work of Christ home to 
the hearts and filling the minds of those waiting men with 
it, started a marvelous movement. A voice is raised, and 
the men of the city flock to hear it. It is the voice of 
Peter, and as you listen you can catch the theme, " The 
wonderful works of God." What are they? Not the 
works which Job faced, but the works of Jesus Christ. 
" A man," he says, " testified to by God by miracles which 
you yourselves saw." Yes, whatever else Jesus Christ 
was, he was a man, with all the limitations of human na- 
ture, save sin. Sin is no part of the human nature, it is 
a crime. The redeemed humanity shall be without sin 
through the long ages. Man plus sin is man less than 
man ; man without sin is fullest man. " This man was 
delivered over by the determinate foreknowledge of 
God." Many years ago a man took a contract to run a 
tunnel through a mountain, in Massachusetts. He 
started two gangs of men, one at each end, working to- 
ward each other ; then he started two other gangs farther 
up also working toward each other. So there were four 
gangs of men all working toward each other to carry out 
the plan of one man. O Caiaphas, in your judgment-hall ! 
O Pilate, in your palace! O Judas, in your treachery! 
You are all free agents, but you are working out the 
purpose of God. Those men in the tunnel wrought of 
their own free will, but they knew not the meaning of the 



THE SPIRITS BIRTHDAY 59 

tunnel they were making. Caiaphas and Pilate, Judas, 
the Roman soldiers and the Jewish mob were all free 
agents, but they were working the redemption of the 
world in putting to death Jesus Christ. All the acts of 
individuals, the building of cities and their destruction, 
the rise and crushing of empires, are all according to the 
foreknowledge of God. And this Christ, delivered to 
these men, was put to death and buried and then raised 
again by the power of the living God and was enthroned 
and given all power in heaven and in earth. The Holy 
Spirit, taking of this finished work of Christ, comes to 
your heart and mine and brings to us this thought and 
word and purpose and makes them real, until Christ be- 
comes more real to us than the money we are making, 
than the cases we are pleading, than the patients we are 
treating. The one reality of our life is Jesus Christ, 
because he is wrought into and through us by the Spirit. 
"Tarry in Jerusalem until ye be endued with power 
from on high, and ye shall be my witnesses." Life is 
witnessing. You know whether a tree is dead or alive, 
whether a baby is dead or alive, whether an idiot can 
think or not. Life is its own witness. Every line of a 
child's life is a human line, and if a man is born of the 
Holy Ghost he has the life of the Holy Ghost in him, 
and the world knows whether he is born of God or not. 
If you are born you are born for a purpose, and that pur- 
pose is to witness for Jesus Christ. I said last Sunday 
that a man who professes Christ and does not live him 
is a hypocrite, but the other side is just as true; if a man 
tries to live Christ without witnessing to him he is just 
as much of a hypocrite. A young man brought me to 
task for saying this. It was because he was trying to 
live that kind of life. But, he said, " It is only a sin of 
omission." If the doctor prescribes medicine for a pa- 



60 HONEST DEBTORS 

tient, and the nurse sleeps instead of administering it, 
causing the patient's death, it is a sin of omission. If on 
the railroad there is a train coming which should be 
switched onto a side-track, and the man on duty falls 
asleep instead of turning the switch, the train crashes into 
another, and hundreds are killed or wounded, it is a sin 
of omission. If the man in charge of the drawbridge 
leaves the draw open, and the train thunders down with 
its load of passengers to destruction, it is a sin of 
omission. " The wages of sin is death," be it omission 
or commission ; and I repeat, that the man who tries to 
live Christ and does not speak of him, is just as much of 
a hypocrite as the other who speaks and does not live 
him, because the genius of the gospel of Christ is found 
in tongues of flame, and we are told to " preach the gospel 
to every creature." The man who does not talk is living 
in disobedience to this command. We have had a man 
here talking every night, and men have been converted by 
scores. When you people in your pews become living 
witnesses of Jesus Christ, Buffalo will be awakened; 
otherwise, you may live to be as old as Methuselah, and 
the world will not know it. The genius of Judaism was 
not speech, but that of Christianity is speech. " And they 
went everywhere preaching the word." Wife, preach it 
to your husband; parents, preach it to your children; 
teachers, preach it to your students ; lawyers, preach it to 
your clients. He that is born into the Holy Spirit is born 
not dumb, but vocal. 



VII 

FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT 
" Then Peter, filled with the Holy Ghost."— Acts 4 : 8. 

The day of Pentecost was a turning-point in the life of 
Peter. It marked the beginning of a new career. On 
that day his character suddenly crystallized. From 
being a creature of circumstances, he became a builder 
of human destinies. The secret or charm is found in a 
single sentence : He adjusted his life to his environment. 

Life as Adjustment to Environment 

Life has been defined as the continuous adjustment of 
internal relations with external relations. When the ad- 
justment stops, the life ceases. Herbert Spencer pictures 
a caterpillar wandering over the face of the earth and 
coming to a plant. He adjusts himself to the leaf of the 
plant. While he was busy adjusting himself, a sparrow 
perched on a neighboring branch and watched him. The 
sparrow could not adjust himself to the leaf; he could to 
the caterpillar, so he settled down on the caterpillar and 
destroyed him. In the summer air a hawk was circling 
about; he could adjust himself to the sparrow, but the 
sparrow could not adjust himself to the hawk. A man 
with a gun was taking a morning walk. He would not 
adjust his gun to hurt a leaf or a caterpillar or a spar- 
row; he sees a hawk. The hawk cannot adjust himself 
to the new environment, his life ends. The man sold the 
hawk at the market-place, and the compensation he re- 

61 



62 HONEST DEBTORS 

ceived aided him to adjust his life to its environment. 
Afterward the hawk made its appearance as an ornament 
on a lady's bonnet. So there is always a continuous series 
of adjustments of internal relations with external rela- 
tions, and when the adjustment ceases, the life ends. This 
is not only true in the physical world, it is true in the 
intellectual world. A child's mind begins to unfold when 
it is placed in right relation with the world that is full of 
thought; if it were possible to take the new-born child 
into a world where there was no thought, the child's 
power of thought, having nothing that would call it forth, 
would die away. 

The same principle holds true in the spiritual world. 
God is the environment of the soul of man, but man loses 
himself in the search, and, instead of finding a window 
through which he can see God, he finds a mirror in which 
he sees himself. He worships his own vision instead of 
worshiping God — he bows down and worships this, and 
religious life ends. The soul of man, out of environment 
with God, ceases to have a spiritual life. The same thing 
is going on all the time in the life of nations. A tribe 
settles down and develops into a nation. It outgrows its 
limitations and projects its national environment on the 
neighboring tribe. If the neighboring tribe does not ad- 
just itself to the new environment, it perishes. The 
British civilization has grown to be the first on earth, and 
now it is pressing its way over South Africa. The Boer 
nation cannot adjust itself and is doomed; it may strug- 
gle for a little while, but the end is certain. It is the sur- 
vival of the fittest. Henry Drummond speaks of a wayside 
pool, which by accident was drained of water. The nu- 
merous forms of life in the pool could not adjust them- 
selves to the new environment of the air, and they dis- 
appeared. You drain the pool away, and the fishes 



FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT 63 

perish, and the tadpole develops. They are made for two 
sorts of environment. 

Noah foresaw a change of environment and adjusted 
himself, and so saved himself and family. 

The Holy Spirit an Environment 

The new environment that came to Peter was the Holy 
Spirit on the day of Pentecost. Christ has been with the 
Father from the beginning. " In the beginning was the 
Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was 
God." Yet Christ when he manifested himself in the 
flesh, passed through a new experience. He elevated and 
redeemed humanity. He came as the Son of God, he re- 
turned as the Son of man. When Christ ascended on high, 
leading captivity captive, he took with him a form of 
character that had never been in heaven before — redeemed 
humanity. He took not only our flesh, the body, but he 
took our intellect, our imagination, our mind. When 
Christ stepped from the Mount of Olives, he took hu- 
manity with him; so then humanity is at the right hand 
of God today. 

The Spirit brooded over chaos and organized the uni- 
verse. When the Holy Spirit came from the living God, 
he brought God with him. When the Master preached, 
the Holy Spirit was not yet given. He could not give 
Christ's finished work until Christ's work was completed. 
And when the Holy Spirit came on the day of Pentecost, 
he came with the finished work of Christ, and Peter 
shifted his adjustment from the environment of Judaism 
to the environment of the Holy Ghost, of Christianity. 
That crystallized his character. Heathenism cannot ad- 
just itself to that Spirit environment; Judaism cannot 
adjust itself ; Judaism is doomed. Men and women who 
adjust themselves to the new environment of the Holy 



64 HONEST DEBTORS 

Ghost, enter upon a new life. Life is the continuous 
adjustment of internal relations with external relations. 

Ye must be born from above, or ye cannot see the new 
kingdom. Peter was filled with the Holy Spirit. Man 
is an organized capacity ; his character depends upon what 
he is filled with. The man who adjusts himself to the 
new environment, is filled with new environment. The 
arms of rebellion are thrown down, and a new King is 
enthroned. A babe is born in Germany beyond the sea. 
He is brought here in infancy ; his father and mother die 
before he is a year old ; the babe is adopted by a family 
and taken to the West. Behind the child are generations 
of German ancestors. That boy grows up on a farm 
where he neither sees nor hears nor reads anything Ger- 
man. At twenty-five years of age he is thoroughly 
American. You might have removed the same infant to 
France, and your German-born babe would have become 
a loyal Frenchman. There is something in environment 
that seems to blot out heredity. 

The Characters Begotten of Adjustment to the Spirit 

As we study this man who is thus filled with the new 
environment of the Spirit, we note three things concerning 
him. First, His surprising knowledge. You read that ser- 
mon of Peter's carefully — his knowledge concerning the 
Old Testament and its relation to Jesus Christ is a genuine 
surprise. He was an unlearned and ignorant fisherman, 
and yet that sermon is one of the masterpieces of ser- 
monic literature. He had passed three years with Christ 
studying ; he tarried with the Master for forty days after 
the resurrection, and yet he did not feel the power of the 
Holy Spirit. On the day of Pentecost the power came, 
and in an instant the knowledge of the Old Testament 
and of Jesus Christ entered into Peter's life. A man 



FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT 65 

stands in a dark room at midnight with a kodak ; he does 
not know what is around him in the room. A friend over 
in the corner strikes a flashlight, there is an instantaneous 
blaze of light, and then sudden darkness, but that blaze 
of light has wrought on the sensitive plate of the kodak 
every image in the room. When Peter surrendered to the 
Holy Ghost, the light flashed upon him immediately. One 
stands on a mountaintop at midnight with not a thing in 
sight ; one might as well be blind. The lightning flashes 
for an instant, and to the eye there comes a vision that 
the years will never veil — the wide sweep, the broad land- 
scape, the surging sea, the struggling ship, are impressed 
upon you, and you can never forget it. If you had stood 
there with closed eyes, you could not have seen it, but 
you adjusted yourself to the environment as the light- 
ning flashed. 

Secondly, With Peter's knowledge came marvelous 
courage. Jesus Christ was a great man. He stood un- 
flinching before a civilization that denied him and cruci- 
fied him. Yet there was no mark of his courage on the 
day that he was baptized. For forty days he lived with 
the powers of evil — not a human face, not a human voice 
— the hiss of the serpent, the roar of the mountain lion, 
the cry of the bird of prey. At the end of forty days he 
came out into the world, and for three years he contested 
in the arena of Judaism for the mastery of the world. 
He faced the Pharisee and the scribe. He never shivered 
when the lash came on the cut shoulders. Peter was a 
born coward. After three years with the Master, he 
shrank when the girl pointed a finger at him, and without 
courage enough to confess his cowardice, he went out and 
cried. But on the day of Pentecost, he faced the world. 
He welcomed the scourge and the prison. What was the 
difference? The new environment. He had adjusted 



66 HONEST DEBTORS 

himself to a Spirit force that gave him courage. We 
often wonder at the martyrs of the past. We are so glad 
we are not called upon to suffer as they were. The cour- 
age comes with the new environment of the Spirit. 

Thirdly, With this courage came power, power to heal 
the sick, to raise the dead. More marvelous than all, 
power to change the warped minds and prejudices of 
men; so that five thousand came to Christ because of a 
single sermon, and three thousand from another. 

Do you know the meaning of the perfect adjustment of 
the human will to the divine will? You can learn hints 
of it in the study of Peter's life on the day of Pentecost. 
He had surrendered himself absolutely to the Holy Ghost. 

The Secret of Adjustment to the Spirit 

How shall we be filled with the same spiritual power? 
First, Peter kneiv the literature of the Spirit. No lawyer 
is expected to know the spirit of the laws, a spirit that 
renews itself in continual legislation at Washington, until 
he has first served his term in the law school; until he 
has tracked the arteries through which the life-blood of 
the law flows. When I enter a lawyer's office, I find the 
walls lined with books on the law. He is supposed to be 
a master of its literature. I find in the doctor's library 
works on medicine. In the minister's library I find books 
on theology and rhetoric and literature. He deals with 
the minds and spirits of men, and the first condition of 
giving spiritual power is to understand the literature of 
the Spirit, and that isn't the average daily newspaper nor 
the last novel, nor the last book on scientific speculation. 
It is the Bible. And one might as well come to a French 
book with a German lexicon as to come to the school of 
the Spirit without a knowledge of the Bible. Learn so 
much as you can of the literature of the Spirit. 



FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT 67 

Secondly, He learned the secret through prayer. 
Prayer is communion — not so much petition as commu- 
nion. You do not come into the king's presence to venti- 
late your opinion, but to learn his. You do not come to 
the throne of God to plead your knowledge, but to learn 
his. We say, " Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on 
earth as it is in heaven/' We think altogether too much 
of prayer as begging. The kingdom will come and the 
will be done when, instead of foisting our judgments on 
the Almighty, we seek his judgments. Study the secret 
of communion. 

In Washington Great Britain has a marvelous states- 
man. Whenever President McKinley wants to know the 
British side of an international question, he seeks that 
man. The Holy Spirit is Christ's Ambassador at the 
courts of earth. He is a very present help in every time 
of need. Cultivate his acquaintance. When Christ was 
upon earth, men sought him, laid their burdens before 
him, and asked for his judgment. Women sought him in 
the crowd. He said, " If I go away I will send another 
Comforter, he shall guide you, he shall glorify me." 
Do you realize that the Holy Ghost is as personal and as 
real today in Buffalo, as Jesus Christ was in Jerusalem 
eighteen hundred years ago? As personally present, as 
willingly waiting, as eagerly expecting as Christ was that 
men should seek him ? 

Take time to be holy. Do not let the sordid rush of 
life rob life of its meaning. Make life deep and broad. 
Be alone much with the Holy Spirit. Cultivate the secret 
of communion with the ever-present Spirit of the living 
God. 

Professor Gates, of Washington, a scientist — not a 
Christian scientist, but a physical scientist — has been busy 
for years studying the secret of the human mind under 



68 HONEST DEBTORS 

the power of thought. He delivered a paper at the Smith- 
sonian Institute, and embodied in it the thought that un- 
pleasant feelings create unhealthful conditions. Each bad 
emotion and each good emotion creates a corresponding 
condition in man. That is the last word of science. As a 
man thinketh in his heart, so is he. Now when you want 
to build, you call the architect and builder, and they em- 
body your thoughts in brick and wood and stone. We are 
all builders. We reconstruct these bodies from within 
around our thoughts. Now instead of calling up benevo- 
lent thoughts and beautiful thoughts, get into communion 
with the Holy Ghost, and think his thoughts. Instead 
of shutting yourself up alone, shut yourself up with the 
Holy Ghost and commune with him. 

And shall you and I pray daily, " Thy kingdom come, 
thy will be done/' and refuse one hour out of twenty- 
four for communion with the only power in the universe 
that can bring the kingdom? That was the secret of 
Peter's change of character — communion with the Holy 
Spirit. 

Thirdly, Submission, The life that struggles against 
its environment gets no benefit from it ; the life that sur- 
renders to it is filled by it. Jesus Christ enveloped Peter 
for three years, as a larger life envelops a less one, and 
Peter struggled against it all the time. He was always 
thrusting his judgment in the face of the Master, and at 
the last he went away in bitter rebellion because the 
Master had not followed his advice. If Christ's work 
had ended then, Peter's life would have been a failure. 
From the day of Pentecost he surrendered, he yielded. 
There is living in a city on the Atlantic seaboard an aged 
woman who lived through the siege of Paris, with her 
two daughters. When the yoke of German supremacy 
was lifted, she decided to begin life over again, and she 



FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT 69 

and her two daughters came to America. The two 
daughters learned the English language and are superb 
teachers of French; but the aged woman cannot today 
speak or understand a word of English. She had made 
up her mind to resist her environment. Her body is in 
America, her soul is in Paris, and there isn't pressure 
enough in the American civilization to conquer that stub- 
born will. And if all the world had become American, 
she would resist it all. Men can be surrounded by the 
Holy Spirit, and resist him, and failing to adjust them- 
selves to him, come short of his life. On the other hand, 
a boy is born in an American family, inherits a large 
estate, and travels to England. He is charmed by the 
English civilization; he likes the settled forms of justice; 
he likes the class distinctions, the fixed outline of the 
social life. He comes back to America, changes his in- 
vestments, sells his property, and goes to London, and 
inside of ten years he is saturated with the English civili- 
zation; he is filled with it, he communes with it; he 
studies its literature ; he has surrendered to its spirit. 

Brother, sister, do you want to be filled with the Holy 
Spirit? Do you want to adjust yourselves to this new 
environment that is bringing in the kingdom of God? 
Everything that is not adjusted is doomed. Study its 
literature. Commune with its Author. Surrender to its 
King, and through Jesus be filled with its Spirit. 



VIII 

A REAL REVIVAL 

"And this was known to all the Jews and Greeks also dwelling 
at Ephesus; and fear fell on them all, and the name of the Lord 
Jesus was magnified. And many that believed came, and confessed, 
and showed their deeds." — Acts 19 : 17, 18. 

A revival is a quickening of life already present. You 
cannot revive a stone because it never had life. Sun and 
rain cannot revive soil, they may quicken the sleeping 
seed in the soil. At Oak Bluffs we had a long drought, 
the grass browned and died, the yard was carpeted with 
dull colors. Men who had hose watered their gardens 
and lawns, others carried water in pails. Rain came, the 
sea heard the prayers of the earth and sent ministering 
spirits, called clouds, the grass revived, life set up a loom 
and wove a new carpet of green, but the paths did not 
change color, they had no life, the water moistened but 
did not quicken; the asphalt road rejected the water and 
was soon black and dry again. Ephesus had a real revi- 
val after the sons of Sceva failed. 

The Zones of Life in a Christian Community 

Bad news travels fast, the unusual attracts. An invalid 
in Baltimore pays five hundred dollars to see an airship 
fly over his wheel-chair and estate; he would not pay 
five cents to see an automobile or trolley-car pass; the 
time will come when navies grappling in the upper blue 
will fail to attract attention. The wandering sheep calls 
forth the shepherd's care ; we pay little heed to the stars 
70 



A REAL REVIVAL 71 

led across the plains of heaven by the invisible shepherd, 
but strain our eyes to watch the wandering star. A thou- 
sand trains speed from Boston to New York unnoticed in 
the papers, but a wreck fills a page with details and pic- 
tures. If you want newspaper notoriety, meet with an 
accident or commit a crime. The fire department runs 
only to fires, the policemen to riots, and the great mass of 
men follow the accidental. If the sons of Sceva had cast 
out the demon in the name of Christ, no one would have 
been surprised, but the failure quickened interest, the dis- 
aster drew the crowd, and it also revealed the power in 
the name of Christ when spoken by Paul. Every Chris- 
tian community may be divided into three strips lying 
parallel : white, black, and between the two, gray. 

White, the men who believe and live by faith, who be- 
lieve and " belive." Children of the light, in whom is no 
darkness. Men whose faith is clear, knowledge of God 
sure, and life consistent. 

A man connected the lamp on his table with the electric 
apparatus for ringing the door-bell, thinking it would 
serve as well as if attached to the wires connected with a 
power-house. When he turned on the current there was 
a sudden explosion, but no light. He sent for an elec- 
trician and told him what he had done. Said the man of 
science, " Didn't you know that it takes five hundred 
times as much power to shine as to make a noise ? " You 
will have to be connected with the heavenly power-house 
in order to shine in a working faith and love. Then let 
your light shine in such a way that men may see, not 
you, but your good works ; and so that seeing your good 
works they may glorify, not you, but your Father. 

Men of power who shine, not men who say, " Lord, 
Lord, and do not the works." Men who are the glory 
of the church and the proof of the Christian religion, 



72 HONEST DEBTORS 

living epistles, peripatetic proofs, evidences of Chris- 
tianity, put up unanswerable arguments. There are men 
and women in every church who can translate truth into 
life, who live pure religion and undefiled, are the wise 
virgins of the parable, who have oil enough to last 
through all the long hour of waiting. 

There is a moral black belt, men without God and with- 
out hope in the world, men who have no faith in God 
and live up to their unbelief. God is not in any of their 
thoughts. Belong to the criminal class, though not al- 
ways labeled; labels do not determine contents of pack- 
age. Men whose presence casts a shadow when light 
shines. Born blind, they stumble through life and are 
stumbled over by pilgrims on the highway of life. 

You can count on them to be on the evil side of every 
moral question. The price is marked on the goods ; they 
will do evil instinctively, and good if paid for it. 

Where Revivals Begin 

Between the white and the black is the gray. Men who 
live in the twilight of morals, close to the white, light, 
close to the black, dark. Chameleon characters, taking 
the hue of environment. Very virtuous at home, vicious 
away from home. Like the waters of Saratoga Springs, 
depending upon the chambers of minerals for their con- 
tents. Have a measure of faith, hope, love, but not 
enough to go into active business. Hope to get into the 
kingdom as barnacles get into port, clinging to a saved 
soul. A revival commences with this gray belt. Like the 
grass, dead on top, with life in the roots, if the rain 
comes ; but left too long even the roots die, and the plow 
ends the tragedy. 

There was a real revival in Ephesus. The sons of 
Sceva experimented with the name of Jesus, second-hand 



A REAL REVIVAL 72 

dealers in the name. " In the name of Jesus whom Paul 
preaches." The demonized man set upon them, beat, 
stripped, and cast them out. Fear fell upon all, and the 
revival began. 

Under the Push of Fear 

Fear is as good a motive as hope, or faith, or love. 
" Moved by fear, Noah built an ark/' " Know nothing, 
fear nothing/' runs the proverb. Terror paralyzes, fear 
moves to action. Men are afraid of electricity, and so 
guard it at every point. The sign, " Third rail alive/' 
is put out because men fear a live rail. The road is 
guarded by the sign, " Look out for the engine," because 
they fear a collision. Men fear fire, and provide a fire 
department and insurance ; fear the criminals, and provide 
policemen and prisons ; fear smallpox, and vaccinate ; fear 
typhoid fever, and fight mosquitoes and flies. Most of 
our preventive medicine grows out of fear of disease. 
" The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." 
Fear is as valid a motive in religion as in any part of 
life. The appeal to fear is a wise appeal. The white 
light brings all colors from the sun, and fear is as divine 
a motive as love or faith or hope. Men sneer when the 
preacher appeals to fear, and call a doctor the same night 
because afraid of the possible causes of a pain. " What 
fools these mortals be." A man who does not know 
enough to fear is not wise enough to be trusted with 
modern machinery. 

The Greater Deeds of Repentance 

When fear fell upon them the name of Jesus was mag- 
nified. "And many that believed [perfect tense] came, 
and confessed, and showed their deeds." " Faith with- 
out works is dead." Fear did what faith had failed to 

F 



74 HONEST DEBTORS 

do, compelled consistency. By faith they had entered the 
new life, were members of the church, but drew their 
income from black magic. The root of faith was not 
long enough to reach the pocketbook and organize the 
contents into life. They had not seen the relation be- 
tween faith and works; they had a model faith, but 
models do not work, they are little forms of what may 
be wrought into great facts; they are not commercially 
valuable, prophecies only, not fulfilments of principles. 
Many a man's dead faith is like the face of a corpse sur- 
rounded by flowers of ritual, and creed, beautiful, but fit 
only to be buried ; effective if you don't touch it, but chill- 
ing if you do. The Christian religion finds many ways 
of expression: Ritualism, playing on the emotions; piet- 
ism, expressing the feeling; altruism, seeking to serve 
others; and justice, the square deal, and the greatest of 
these is justice. Ritual, piety, and altruism are all easier 
than justice. It is easier to give a share of money evilly 
gained, than to live poorly on money gained only in just 
ways. " The kingdom of heaven is righteousness, joy, 
and peace in the Holy Spirit." We try to vault over 
righteousness and land in the green pastures of joy and 
peace. The God of all the earth will do right, so will his 
children; the only proof of being children is likeness of 
character. It is easier to give generously than to walk 
justly, to love mercy than to deal righteously. A real 
revival compels men to tell their deeds, and destroy evil 
sources of income. Clean hands and a pure heart are the 
conditions of standing in the hill of the Lord. Anybody 
can make a golden calf on the plain if he can get the 
gold, but it takes a rare man to stand on Sinai and re- 
ceive the Law. 

John the Baptizer had a real revival by the Jordan, 
when his converts brought forth fruit fit for repentance. 



A REAL REVIVAL 75 

Christian character is not made as Christmas trees are, 
by hanging gifts of the Spirit on the empty branches; 
fruit comes from within and reveals the sap in the soul. 

Cutting the Tap-root of Income 

Jesus had a real revival in Jericho ; he had a small con- 
gregation, but he saved the whole of it. The richest man 
in Jericho climbed a tree to see the Master ; called to the 
ground, he walked to his home with Christ ; the outcome 
caused Christ to say, " This day has salvation come to this 
house." Not a word of a wonderful experience in the 
feelings, nor of signing a creed accepted by the mind. 
Listen ! " The half of my goods I give to the poor, and if 
I have wronged any man I restore fourfold." Restora- 
tion is much harder than giving. Generosity warms the 
heart, but justice empties the pocketbook. What, think 
you, would be the outcome if every member of the 
churches in the United States should join the convert of 
Jesus in Jericho? Socialism would perish before night. 
Socialism is the fog from the sea of injustice, and so 
long as the sea is the fog will be, confusing mariners and 
threatening business. 

Many brought their books of magic and burned them. 
Saved by faith, but living on magic. Ephesus was famed 
for magic, sorcery, black art. Ephesian words are often 
referred to by heathen writers. The Ephesians were 
wont to carry curious characters written on paper or 
leather, as a safeguard against evil spirits, much as ignor- 
ant men carry scapulars now. Magicians advised the de- 
monized to repeat magical phrases. Croesus, on his 
funeral pyre, died repeating Ephesian sentences. In the 
Olympian games an Ephesian wrestler won victories over 
his opponent from Miletus because he had words bound 
about his ankles; when these were torn off he failed. 



76 HONEST DEBTORS 

Rags of superstition still cover the back of ignorance. 
And many who profess faith in God make a living by 
reading the future and selling charms. These men, re- 
vived, brought fifty thousand pieces of silver in value of 
magical books and burned them in the public square. A 
man is really revived when he cuts the tap-root of in- 
come, if the root reaches a poisonous source. 

We expect men in the black belt to practise magic, but 
when men in the gray belt do, we are puzzled, and the 
sure sign and proof of a revival is a clearer sense of 
right and the prompt practise of justice. 

Ever and again the search-light falls upon a source of 
income, a method of business that startles, but we are 
doubly shocked when we learn that the men who profit 
thereby are members of the church of Christ. Men who 
claim to be saved by grace have to be kept honest by civil 
laws passed by men who make no claims to religion. 
There is something wrong in a form of faith that does 
not quicken the conscience and clear the judgment. If 
Christ is the vine and Christians are the branches, why 
wild grapes? If Christ is the head, and the church is the 
body, why deeds that would shame the members of a 
harlot's body? The Masonic lodge forbids membership 
to liquor dealers; many churches fondle liquor dealers. 
The law of the State seeks support by taxation; many 
Christians dodge taxes, the traps set at the custom-house 
catch many members of churches. The Christian land- 
lord cannot always be trusted to render unto Caesar what 
is Caesar's in the way of sanitary plumbing, and must be 
watched carefully. The Christian employer cannot al- 
ways be trusted to deal justly with his help, even on the 
low plane of civil law. Christ's trouble began when he 
meddled with the temple court, and cut down the income 
that flowed into private coffers through forbidden chan- 



A REAL REVIVAL 77 

nels. The house of prayer was made a den of thieves by 
the religious leaders of their day. A real revival compels 
men to deal justly and cut off evil sources of income. 

An Aseptic Christianity 

We forbid common drinking-cups at fountains, or in 
cars, fearing disease, but " the jingle of the guinea heals 
the hurt that honor feels," and we welcome money with- 
out challenge for charities. The diseases that have swept 
nations into ruin have not been physical, but moral. 
The new medicine will guard the body of the state, but 
the better the body the worse if it house an immoral soul. 
We need an aseptic Christianity, business methods as 
clean as food and water for spiritual health. 

One reason why the ordinary buyer needs protection 
is that all the time new methods are being evolved by 
which inferior fabrics are given the surface appearance 
of good fabrics. Cotton is given the appearance of wool ; 
poor wool, the look and finish of fine wool. Cotton is 
chemically treated with magnesia to produce that sense 
of coolness to the touch by which many people test linen. 
In spinning the cotton that is to be substituted for linen 
thread, irregularities, such as the little lumps which always 
occur in linen thread, can be imitated. Another cotton 
imitation of linen is obtained by substituting mercerized 
cotton thread for linen thread. This adulteration is 
largely practised in the manufacture of cheap table-linen 
and towels. 

In cheap woolen material the thread is often cotton 
with a cover of wool twisted around it, or wool is simply 
laid in along with the cotton threads without twisting. I 
examined some cheap woolen dress goods in which the 
material was woven entirely of cotton thread; the wool 
consisted of short threads felted on by moisture, heat, 



78 HONEST DEBTORS 

and pressure to the surface of the already woven fabric. 
When this woolen surface was washed off with caustic 
soda, a perfect fabric of cotton remained. Cheap ma- 
terial " all wool and a yard wide " can technically fulfil 
the guaranty " all wool " and yet have little wearing 
quality. The woolen thread in these fabrics is made from 
the wool remaining in old rags after the cotton has been 
burnt out by acids. This is called " wool twice on the 
sheep's back." Wool thus obtained can be mixed with 
good wool and used for a better grade of material. 
When the wool " twice on the sheep's back " is used 
alone, however, the resulting fabric is poor and thin and 
quickly wears out. 

Silk is chiefly adulterated by the addition of weighting 
material to the thread. Before weaving the silk thread 
is weighted by adding sugar starch or mineral salts. 
These salts swell the thread and make it heavier. Natu- 
rally the effect on the wearing quality of the woven fabric 
is bad. Every woman has at times seen what looks like 
minute pinholes suddenly appear in an almost new silk 
skirt. The rough particles of the mineral salts that re- 
main in the goods rub against the fine silk threads when 
the friction of wear is applied to the garment, and this 
causes the threads to break. 

Surely, not all manufacturers are sons of Belial, some 
of the captains of industry are Christians, but can you 
tell which ones by the output of the mill? Much of the 
stock is owned by Christians, but do they know the 
secret places where the dividends are made? If Christ 
cannot quicken a keen conscience, just what does he do 
when he saves a soul ? 

We shrink from the fleeing man who caught up a boy 
and used him as a shield, saving his own life by sacrific- 
ing the boy, but see no special crime in pushing boys and 



A REAL REVIVAL 79 

girls into mills, that by cheap labor we may have larger 
profits; the stream of business life runs as red as the 
Nile did when the plague struck Egypt. We strip the 
hillside for pulp to spread news of crime and shame, 
and grind the growing generation into pulp to feed the 
mill of business and declare dividends at the cost of life. 
We expect that of men in the black belt, and of the gray 
close to the black, but what advantageth it a man if he 
has faith in the perfect tense, and income from magic? 
God send us a real revival. 



IX 

REDEMPTION THROUGH BLOOD 

" In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgive- 
ness of sins, according to the riches of his grace." — Ephesians 1 : 7. 

The Epistle to the Ephesians was written about the year 
62, in the city of Rome, by Paul in captivity, in the Greek 
language. Scholars have translated the text into the 
English language. The translation of words is not 
always the translation of thought. Words are like mir- 
rors, they give back to you what you carry to them. The 
car that is going down Main Street carries a half dozen 
men. It is the same car, and yet it means a different 
destiny to each man. One man leaves the car that he 
may be transferred to a Seneca Street car; another to a 
Niagara Street car. One to enter a broker's office that 
he may risk an investment ; another that he may secure a 
doctor's advice and get a prescription; another that he 
may find a lawyer and have explained to him a question 
of law. So it is with words ; one word carries different 
meanings to different people. It is the same car, and 
yet to each of the half dozen men it means a different 
termination. Words as spoken to one man may mean 
one thing, while they arouse in your mind quite another 
association, and mean to you other things. 

I speak the word " home." It means to me the experi- 
ence of my life, it means to you the experience of your 
life, and while I think of home in the light of memory 
and see the home of my boyhood, you see the home of 
80 



REDEMPTION THROUGH BLOOD 81 

your boyhood ; and while we meet in the one word home, 
we are far apart in meaning. I speak the word 
" mother," and it arouses in me the memory of a sweet- 
voiced, loving woman, who made home a heaven for me, 
and who is now gone. It perhaps means to you a sweet- 
voiced and loving friend who makes home to you a 
heaven today. 

The Other Man's Background and Your Own 

You cannot always tell what is meant by a word in the 
mind of a speaker until you get his point of view. What 
did Paul mean by the word " redemption " ? Not what 
do you mean, but what had Paul in mind? Now, Paul 
was a converted Jew, and the background of Paul's think- 
ing was Judaism. As Lake Erie empties itself into the 
Niagara River, and you analyze the water in the river 
and the lake and you find them the same, so Judaism 
emptied itself into Paul's words, Paul's manner of 
thought. 

And against the great background of Judaism, we are 
thinking of blood. In the Jewish thought the life was in 
the blood, and the blood was the life. " Thou shalt not 
eat the flesh with the blood in it," ran the law, for in the 
flesh is the blood, and the blood is the life. Jesus Christ'| 
atonement was a blood atonement. The blood atones 
for your life in some strange way. The life of a beast 
was in its blood, and that life was made over to the credit 
of another. Animal sacrifices were made on the altars 
for this reason. The Jews must not eat meat with blood 
in it, it must always have the blood drained before they 
can eat it. And yet you and I enjoy our rare roast beef. 
How are you going to go from your dinner with our 
thought of life, to Paul's dinner with his thought of life? 
When the animal was sacrificed on the altar, the blood 



82 HONEST DEBTORS 

flowed out ; the body that was left behind was dead. The 
blood that flowed out carried the life with it, and the 
life went with the blood, not staying in the beast. When 
we are redeemed through blood, we are redeemed through 
life. 

Giving What is Your Life 

Words are symbols, they are not the things themselves. 
Here is a man,, who, after years of patient toil and small 
economies, has saved a thousand dollars. He looks at 
his bank-book now and then. That bank-book is a sym- 
bol of a thousand dollars, and that bank-book is a symbol 
of economy, of long years of patient toil and petty saving 
— years that he has narrowed himself. He has said: 
" No, I cannot travel, I must save ; I cannot go to the 
concert, I must save ; I cannot go to the sea-shore, I must 
save. For evil days are coming, when the grasshopper 
will be a burden, and I must look into the future to pro- 
vide for it." And so he saves year by year against the 
evil day. And this money in the bank is also a symbol of 
the future. As he thinks of it, it means a little room, 
food, clothing, doctor's bills, and money to bury his body. 
And when he looks at the bank-account, the bank-account 
symbolizes what he has denied himself. That money 
means his life. His brother comes to him and lays before 
him the burden of his story. He has been ill; he has a 
large doctor's bill ; he is out of work now, and the family 
are suffering. They will be put out on the street unless 
they pay the rent. The man goes to the bank and takes 
out five hundred dollars of that money. That means so 
much of his life — he has taken from his veins his own 
life-blood. He has put that blood into his brother. For 
the money is the life. You may toil early and late, and 
economize, and by-and-by you have accumulated your 



REDEMPTION THROUGH BLOOD 83 

bank-account. In it you can see the years of your life. 
You have shrunk the web, you have bleached the colors, 
you have spoiled the cloth, and it all lies in your bank- 
account. But you are thinking of the day when you will 
need it. One day you step into the broker's office and 
make a bad investment. In the morning you are a bank- 
rupt, your money is gone. You go to your room, and, 
taking a revolver, pull the trigger, and your life is gone. 
Your life went, not when you touched the trigger, but 
when you lost your investment. 

When you are lifting a great church debt, people come 
forward and give the savings of years. They have given 
their life as really as though they had shouldered the 
Mauser and gone to the Philippines, as really as though 
they had laid their life down on the field of Gettysburg. 
It is like cutting off the right hand, or plucking out the 
right eye, to give one's life like that. It is genuine 
sacrifice. 

How Christ Put Himself into Word and Deed 

Now, in Jewish thought, the blood was the life; the 
body meant nothing, blood meant everything. He who 
gave his blood gave his life, and we are redeemed through 
the blood of Jesus Christ. It is the life sacrificed, and not 
the life hoarded, that saves. The life-blood must be 
poured from the veins. Christ poured out his life in the 
sacrifice on the cross before that life became available to 
you and to me. He put some of his life into his teach- 
ings; he put more of it into his miracles, but the great 
gift was, when with pierced and broken heart, he poured 
out the blood and with it the life. 

There is a peculiar quality about Christ's teachings, 
and that quality is ours because he sacrificed himself in 
spoken words. Only so much of a man's mind as he puts 



84 HONEST DEBTORS 

into spoken words, vitalizes the thought. You have read 
books and novels and heard sermons that had no grit 
to them because the man did not put any life in. He had 
not put his life into the words he spoke. When he had 
finished, he was fresh as when he began. He did not put 
his nervous force and thought into it, and at the end of 
the sermon or lecture or the book, he did not have to go 
away and rest a little while because he had given so much 
of himself. Christ put himself into his teachings and his 
miracles, and he was filled with a great electric force. 
When he was walking on the street, and the woman 
touched the hem of his garment, he turned and said : 
"Who hath touched me? Somebody hath touched me, 
for I perceive that virtue hath gone out of me." Christ 
when healing the blind and lifting the dead, must go away 
and recoup his strength by communion with God. He 
had given his life. So we are led, step by step, to the 
great gift of his life. Now the life becomes yours and 
mine when it is given up, and the blood is a symbol. It 
is language, but life is the thought. It is the machine, 
but life is the power that drives it. And the blood shed 
on Calvary by him redeemed the world because of the 
quality of life he gave to it. 

For centuries the Niagara River has plowed its way 
from lake to lake. Buffalo has grown up within sight 
and sound of its roaring tumult. Men stooped and 
dipped up in cups its water. Years passed, and Buffalo 
didn't need any more water, she did need fire and power, 
heat and light and force. And so men went up alongside 
the river and dug a pit, and they put machinery in the 
bottom of the pit, and put dynamos at the top, and wired 
it to the city. Now the question is, How can you trans- 
form that rushing tide of water into fire and force. 
Never, except the river be willing to sacrifice itself. It 



REDEMPTION THROUGH BLOOD 85 

must go into contact with the organized machinery. Men 
came to the side of the river and whispered of the world's 
need. They said : " It will freeze but for warmth from 
you. It will bear its own burdens but for strength from 
you. Will you give yourself ? " The river nods, Yes ; 
the life strikes the organized wheel at the bottom of the 
pit, and fire and force and warmth and heat are born; 
but it is by the surrender of the river. That is the mean- 
ing of the life-work and the death gift of Jesus Christ. 
The world is cold, the world is dark, the world is bur- 
dened; the world cannot help itself. It can bear its 
burdens and stagger to its grave; it can shiver by its 
fires; but there are needs in the soul of a man that call 
for a divine redemption, and how shall we get it ? Go to 
the Son of God who shares the glory of the Father. As 
we tell him the world's needs, he comes down to our 
level. He falls upon the human organization. He emp- 
ties himself. He makes himself of no reputation. He 
takes upon himself the form of a slave. He is obedient 
unto death, the death of the cross; and out of that life 
comes the life that has borne the world's burden of sin 
and the warmth that has quickened the world to its salva- 
tion, until now it is coming more and more to accept the 
sacrifice. Buffalo is redeemed from darkness by the gift 
of Niagara. The world is redeemed from darkness by 
the gift of Christ. 

Christ Coming Down to Our Level 

Now in order for anything in the way of thought or 
life to do you good, it must come down to your level. 
Christ came down to our level. He took that old divine 
teaching, that the life was in the blood, and the blood was 
in the life, and because children were partakers of flesh 
and the blood, he also became a partaker of the same, and 



86 HONEST DEBTORS 

he took upon himself the seed of Abraham. He dropped 
his divine force to the level of our human need. 

The Master in the great parable of life, speaks of sow- 
ing seed in three different kinds of soil, but all kinds of 
soil are alike in this : They are dead. There is no power 
in soil to organize itself. There is no power in sunlight 
to organize the soil. And for centuries the sun pours 
its gift of golden light upon the bankrupt earth, and it 
doesn't circulate; and the rain comes down in silver 
showers to the earth, and it doesn't circulate. You may 
shower your golden sunlight and your silver rain upon a 
dead earth, and it is no richer than it was before. It lies 
there and bakes in the sunlight and soaks in the rain. 
By-and-by the man comes with the seed, and the seed has 
the life in it, but the seed must surrender itself to the 
earth, or it can never lift the earth to its own likeness. 
You go to the nodding grains of wheat as they wave in 
the autumn day and say : " Are you willing to surrender 
yourselves from this wheat head? Are you willing to 
give up your life that the earth may be renewed? " And 
the wheat-head nods and you pass along. 

You go to the great Christ and you say : " There is a 
dead earth waiting for redemption. It needs the touch 
of the divine Christ. Are you willing to give yourself 
to the redemption of the world? " And the golden grain 
of the Son of Man nods, and the work begins. Now 
when the golden grain of wheat falls into the earth, it 
gives its life. Its life is in the germ. When Christ gives 
himself, he gives his life in its human nature. The earth 
now taken in hand by the organizing force of the wheat, 
begins to build up, and so much of it as surrenders to the 
wheat, takes on great beauty, as it lifts into the sunlight 
which comes to meet it ; and you have a new form of life. 
It is more than the earth, more than the sun, more than 



REDEMPTION THROUGH BLOOD 87 

the rain. God meets man in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ 
lifts man toward God. Jesus Christ brings God down to 
man. In Christ we have a new and living way. We 
have redemption through him, the forgiveness of sins — 
redemption through his blood, and this redemption came 
to us when he gave his life. 

The Gift that Saves 

Men emphasize the example of Jesus Christ. It is 
well. Men emphasize the teachings of Jesus Christ. It 
is well. Wherein lies the power of his example ? In the 
amount of life he lived and gave. But he did not put 
enough redeeming life into what he did to save a soul, 
aside from the sacrifice on Calvary. There is the gift, 
the redemption that saves. 

This redemption through Christ redeems from the 
power of memory. A sin in the memory is always a 
source of danger. It is like a mortgage on your house; 
it may be foreclosed at any time that you cannot pay the 
interest. It is like seed sown in the soil; it is liable to 
spring up at any time. The other day we had a south 
wind and the genial rain for twelve hours. We went to 
bed looking at the brown earth ; we arose looking at the 
green earth. Who can tell when a dead sin rooted in 
the memory shall not become a living sin, between sun- 
rise and sundown? The blood of Jesus Christ blotted 
sin from the memory, and Jehovah said : " I will re- 
member your sins no more, I will blot them out as a thick 
cloud. I will cast them into the depths of the sea." Be 
sure, if your sin has faded from the page of God's 
memory, it has gone from the page of your memory. 
What has become of the morning cloud touched by the 
scepter of the sun as he mounts his throne ? It has gone. 
It is not in the power of man to bring it back. What has 



88 HONEST DEBTORS 

become of your transgressions when touched by the 
scepter of Christ? They have gone, you cannot find 
them. What has become of the sin cast into the depths 
of the sea? Scientific men tell us that if you lower a 
glass tube below a certain depth, to get the temperature 
of the sea, and try to bring up your glass tube, it has 
been shattered. The pressure of the weight of the water 
has shivered the scientific instrument. Sins that are cast 
into the depths of the sea are shattered, shivered, de- 
stroyed. When sin is between me and God, I see only 
sin; when God is between me and sin, I see only God. 
God is the horizon of the universe, and when sin is behind 
him, it is done for. You never can find it again. And 
that is what redemption through the blood means. The 
fingers wipe the page of memory, and the sin disappears. 

If you have been to Rome, you will remember the finest 
bit of architecture that has come across the centuries is 
the grand old Pantheon. Its massive wall lifts like an 
island in the sea. It is the finest dome that was ever 
molded by the hand of man. Through the dome is an 
opening without glass, and through it you look up into 
the blue Italian sky. It was the old pagan Pantheon, or 
house of all gods ; and whenever Rome conquered a new 
kingdom, she brought the gods into the Pantheon, and 
they were set around side by side in niches. When 
Christianity came to the front, Caesar sought to set aside 
an alcove for Christ. This new god should stand in the 
Pantheon. But Christ said, " Everything or nothing " ; 
and today, as you lift the heavy leather doors and pass 
into the Pantheon, there is no hint or memory of a 
heathen god. All the altars are Christian. The air is 
heavy with the incense of Christian worship. Christ has 
driven every god out of that heathen Pantheon, and taken 
possession of it for himself. That is redemption through 



REDEMPTION THROUGH BLOOD 89 

blood. Line by line Christ conquers the whole kingdom, 
until there is not a rebellious province or a backward state 
where Christ does not rule. 

He redeems the imagination. The imagination is the 
slave of memory. The imagination weaves the pattern 
of the stuff that memory brings. When memory fails, 
the imagination falters. When the memory brings woolen 
goods, the imagination weaves woolen fabric ; silk goods, 
silk fabrics ; and when the memory brings the redeeming 
blood of Jesus Christ, the pattern changes, and from 
woolen we go to silk, and from thoughts of man to 
thoughts of God. 

The Christian religion is not only a quickening of the 
latent powers; it is a bringing in of the divine power. 
" Lazarus, I say unto thee, arise/' and it was the " I " 
that made him arise, and not merely the Lazarus that 
arose. Many years ago in a neighboring State a man 
bought a little tract of land with a house on it, and around 
the edge he planted a buckthorn hedge, and it grew in 
beauty for years. He sold the house, and the new owner 
put a row of maple trees alongside the hedge. Years 
passed by, the buckthorn hedge withered and died. By- 
and-by it was thrown into a bonfire. The strong maple 
trees had taken the strength out of the soil around its 
roots, and kept out the sunlight from it. The buckthorn 
hedge had nothing to do but to die. Before you sur- 
render your life to worldliness, to sensuality, let Christ 
come and plant the trees of a new kingdom, and the first 
thing you know the old hedge is dying down. The new 
roots have sapped its strength, and from memory, imagi- 
nation, and will the old passes, and all things become new 
through the blood, through the life of Jesus Christ; for 
it is the law of life always that the stronger dominates 
the weaker, and there is no life so strong in God's uni- 
G 



90 HONEST DEBTORS 

verse as the life of God manifest in the flesh for the 
redemption. It is the survival of the fittest, it is the kill- 
ing of the unfittest ; and you go and rip up the buckthorn 
hedge and make a bonfire, and rest yourselves in the 
shadow of the new life. We are redeemed then from the 
power of sin, in the memory, by the blood of Jesus Christ, 
that is, by the life which Jesus Christ offered on Calvary 
when he poured out the blood from a broken heart for 
the redemption of the world. 



SALVATION BY CHRIST 

" Neither is there salvation in any other ; for there is none other 
name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved." 
—Acts 4 : 12. 

Peter states a fact and a method. The fact is, we must 
be saved; the method is, in the name of Jesus Christ. 
Salvation is a necessity, not a luxury ; it is a " must be," 
not a " may be." Life is full of meaning when necessi- 
ties are met, though luxuries are denied. Life is bare of 
meaning when necessities are denied. The bottom fact 
concerning human nature is that it is lost; the bottom 
fact concerning Jesus Christ is that he saves. 

A miracle is a parable wrought into deeds. The 
Master, in a parable, teaches us that the kingdom of 
heaven is like seed sown in a garden, organizing and 
yielding a harvest. The kingdom of heaven, then, is put- 
ting life into death. Cultivating the soil brings no har- 
vest; what the field needs is seeding. What human na- 
ture needs is saving. The organizing principle of life 
is not in the flesh. That which is born of the flesh is 
flesh; that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. If that 
which is born of the flesh is to enter into the kingdom of 
the Spirit, it must be born of the Spirit, born from above, 
born again. The kingdom of heaven is like a nobleman 
who went into a far country, and got for himself a king- 
dom. Returning to his home, he brought it back. The 
kingdom is the highest form of organized power we 
know. Its civilization, institutions, schools, libraries, 

91 



92 HONEST DEBTORS 

courts of justice, business, are brought in; the nobleman 
did not find them. There was a leavening power. Sift- 
ing the flour again and again does not leaven it ; molding 
it with dainty fingers does not leaven it. There must be 
power of leavening put into it. The kingdom of heaven 
is the uplifting power that is brought to the human mind. 
Jesus Christ brought it. He put life into death, sight into 
blindness, hearing into deafness, health into leprosy. He 
did not evolve these things from leprosy, death, disease, 
and blindness ; he brought them to these various forms of 
death. 

A Lost Man 

Thus we find in parable and miracle that human nature 
is dead. If it is to be lifted, it is to be from above, and not 
from within. The man by the Beautiful Gate was a lost 
man; he was born lame, he was born lost. As a babe it 
didn't make so much difference, for a babe cannot use its 
feet if it has them. The babe clings with tiny hands to 
mother's and father's strength. But when the hands of 
boyhood opened the gate of infancy and beckoned to the 
growing child to walk, he could not walk. He was lost 
to boyhood. He was born and reared on a St. Helena's 
island of bondage. The tidal wave swept past him. 
White-winged ships came and went, but his horizon never 
widened. He was lost. He was like a steamship an- 
chored in a harbor with steam up, the eager sea beckon- 
ing, but he could not break the grip of the anchor on the 
granite. He was lost to the sea. The eager boy's life 
had no meaning for him. He might sit by the bank of 
the brook and watch its tumultuous roar and rush, but 
dared not plunge into it. Boys are too busy to care for 
crippled mates; a boy's life is too short, the joys and de- 
lights are too many, life is too full. And the poor pris- 



L 



SALVATION BY CHRIST 93 

oner sat in his cage and watched, but did not live. When 
the gateway of boyhood widened into manhood, and the 
waiting world called for the new strength, there was no 
answer. He could bear no burdens. He himself was a 
burden, and they bore him daily and laid him at the gate 
of the temple. He could not run the race of life, he 
could not fight the fight of life; he could sit behind his 
bars and watch and wait and wither, but he could not live. 
He was lost to the social functions of society. Amuse- 
ment has no place for cripples, a masquerade has no call 
for the broken and maimed. He was lost to the business 
world ; the eager strenuous life that calls for all the power 
there is in a man, for his best, has no use for cripples. 
So they spread a mat for him by the temple and laid him 
upon it and left him. He was lost to the temple service. 
He could lie there and watch, but no cripple could stand 
by the altar of Jehovah. He was lost to all that makes 
life full to you and me. 

How are you going to help the man? By rubbing his 
ankles w r ith your hands? You have no more strength 
than you need for your own burdens. By calling upon 
him to arouse the spring of life in him? There is no 
spring of life in him. As the Jordan pours its abundance 
into the Dead Sea, so the world pours itself into him, 
and grows salt and bitter. He is a lost man. 

The mind has much power over the body, but the body 
has quite as much over the mind. You try to think when 
the grippe is foreclosing its mortgage, and see how you 
succeed. You try to do business after you have been kept 
awake night after night with rheumatism, and see how 
you make out. The water channels its way through the 
soil and makes the river, but the bank of the river pol- 
lutes the running water. The mind has much to do with 
the body, but the body has much to do with the mind. 



94 HONEST DEBTORS 

When Mr. Moody looked at Gladstone, he said, " I wish 
I had your head " ; and Gladstone said, " I wish I had 
your body." Many a man with over-balanced bfain has 
longed for a sturdy body to tend the machinery of life. 

A Lost Man's Measure of Manhood 

The beggar by the Beautiful Gate was reduced to a 
single thought — money. All he cared for men was what 
he could make out of them. He sought men as the oil- 
seekers seek the wells of Pennsylvania, to pump some- 
thing out. He sought men as the miners seek Alaska, to 
get something out of them. His measure of manhood 
was money. If you can find a human being any lower 
than that, I don't want to know him. Money has its uses, 
but how quickly you find its limitations! and when you 
have found only its limitations and not its uses — when 
the measure of every man you meet is money — you are a 
lost man. God made man, and man made money, and 
when you stop with what man makes and do not hold on 
to what God makes, you are a lost man. Gold alone, is 
only fetters ; used, it is a power. Not very long ago two 
men sat together at dinner at the Waldorf-Astoria in 
New York. They had been college mates. One had set- 
tled down in Western New York on a farm, and made a 
life. The other had settled down in Wall Street and 
made a living. The one was worth his acres/the other 
was worth twenty millions of dollars in money. The 
farmer had his wife and two daughters with him. Ad- 
dressing his wealthy friend, he said, "Where is your 
wife?" "In Paris." " Where is your daughter ? " "In 
London." " Where is your son? " " On his yacht, and I 
live here alone. I would to God I had somebody who 
cared for me and not for my money. When I visited 
London, my daughter hurried me down to Brighton to 



SALVATION BY CHRIST 95 

get me out of her social circle. When I am on my son's 
yacht, he is ashamed of me; and all they care for me is 
my money." A few mornings after, the millionaire was 
found dead in his room. His wife and son and daughter 
were lost. They watched the father as you would watch 
the mint in Philadelphia, as a money-coining machine. 
They thought no more of their father than the boy at 
Christmastime thinks of the Christmas tree. He has no 
thought of the tree, but of the beautiful gifts that are 
hanging upon it. This man was not a vicious man, he 
was not a drunken man, he was an orthodox Jew by the 
gate of the temple; but he was a lost man, for all he 
could see in manhood was money. He considered him the 
greatest man who gave the greatest gift, and he was the 
smallest man who gave the smallest gift. God pity the 
man ! He was lost. 

A Civilization Partially Saved 

Up the temple steps come two saved men. Wonder- 
ful men these. Their kindergarten training was among 
the nets of the fishermen by the sea. Their university 
training was under that Master of Teachers, Jesus Christ. 
Silver and gold had they none, but they were men, saved 
men, and they did not measure life by money standards, 
but by spiritual standards. Two marvelous men — they 
had been with Christ three years. They had stood by the 
full tomb, and had peered into the empty tomb. They 
had received the gift of the Holy Ghost, and the door 
of our Christian civilization swung on the hinges of these 
two human lives. The truth those men had in their heads 
and hearts when they came up to the temple has done 
more for the world than all other truth — artistic, scien- 
tific, literary, and governmental. Peter and John with 
their message have done more for the world than Colum- 



96 HONEST DEBTORS 

bus when he found America. We could do without 
America, but what would the world be without the mes- 
sage of Jesus Christ as Peter and John preached it? 
These two men have done more for the world that Caesar 
or Alexander, than William the Conqueror or Washing- 
ton or Lincoln, or all great men of all centuries. Peter 
and John were wonderful men, and yet when that cripple 
by the gateside saw them, he saw nothing in them but 
sources of money. Wasn't he a lost man, this man who 
could see nothing in Peter and John, nothing in the 
gospel of Jesus Christ, nothing in the hand of God, but 
alms? He is of interest to us because he is a symbol or 
type for illustration of a lost humanity. Jesus Christ 
came to seek and save that which was lost. He came 
because men were lost. The Christian civilization that 
we have is partially saved ; the civilization that he found 
was totally lost. 

Ours is a Christian civilization, so called. It is like a 
law that we now have, by which, owing to a temporary 
spasm of fear for hydrophobia, our dogs must go muz- 
zled in the streets. This law will perhaps cease in a few 
months. But humanity walks the streets of its Christian 
civilization muzzled and protected with prisons and courts 
of justice. When you want to make a bargain with a 
man, you sit down and muzzle him with an ironclad con- 
tract. You Christian men don't dare trust one another 
out of sight. And yet you talk of being saved. Our 
whole civilization is a crystallized argument showing that 
we are not saved through and through yet. Our civiliza- 
tion is lost because the brand of money is on it all. Like 
the cripple by the gate-side, we cannot see anything hu- 
man or divine without the dollar stamp on it. If that 
isn't being lost, what is? You say a man is lost with a 
fever for alcohol ? Granted. You say a man is lost with 



SALVATION BY CHRIST 97 

a passion of sensuality? Granted. But is your concep- 
tion of salvation a man who cannot see anything but 
money in a civilization like ours? To the crippled beg- 
gar by the gate-side the measure of man was what he 
expected to find in man; and Peter and John, by whose 
preaching three thousand men had been lifted from dark- 
ness to light, said, " Look on us," and he looked, expect- 
ing to receive an alms. It is awful. Peter saved the 
man; spoke a word or two to him, lifted him to strong 
manhood. That is the difference between money and 
life. Money came and money went, but the cripple stayed 
on forever. Life came once, and the cripple went on a 
man. 

The Name That Saves 

And this man who wrought the miracle is an authority 
on the secret of power, and when the high court said to 
him, " By what authority or by what name do you do 
this?" he said, "Jesus Christ." A man in a laboratory 
works an experiment with success. He is an authority 
on that experiment. This man in the laboratory of the 
world wrought a marvelous experiment, and they asked, 
" What is the secret of it? " and he said, " In the name of 
Jesus Christ of Nazareth." The man who can do things 
is an authority on doing things, and Peter did something ; 
Peter is an authority as to how he did it. " In the name 
of Jesus Christ of Nazareth ; neither is there salvation in 
any other; for there is none other name under heaven 
given among men whereby we must be saved." 

Gordon of Khartoum, the great English general, left 
among his papers a slip of paper on the Garden of Eden. 
He was a profound Biblical scholar and a scientist. He 
comes to the conclusion that Jehovah selected two trees 
and made them sacraments; the one was a sacrament of 



98 HONEST DEBTORS 

knowledge and the other of life. They were to be used 
as sacraments ; they had a particular power given to them 
for that purpose, and when they had served that pur- 
pose the sacrament had ceased. Now we take common 
bread and common wine, and it is the sacrament of the 
Lord's Supper. It is the medium through which we see 
the finished work of Jesus Christ. You take your red, 
your blue, and your white cloth, and sew them together 
in stripes and stars, and you have made a sacrament of 
the flag. It is the sacrament of the nation. Through the 
one tree a man will get knowledge, and through the other 
a man will get life, as he obeys or disobeys. God has 
taken the name of Jesus Christ and made it the sacra- 
mental name of salvation. Names cover characters and 
spell lives — stand for works. For instance, I speak cer- 
tain names, certain lives and certain works come to your 
mind. " Thou shalt call his name Jesus [Saviour], for he 
shall save his people from their sins " ; and there is no 
other name. Abraham stands for faith, Moses for law, 
David for psalms, Solomon for proverbs, Paul for doc- 
trine, John for love, Jesus for salvation. There is no 
other name given or identified with salvation. It is the 
name that carries within itself the contents of the divine 
salvation. It is the " open sesame " to salvation. It is 
the pass-key to the papers of salvation. Abraham is not 
a symbol of salvation; he was saved by faith. Moses 
stood for law, but the law condemns, the law doesn't save. 
David stood for psalms, but psalms are to be sung by 
saved men. Solomon stood for proverbs, but proverbs do 
not bring new wisdom to human kind. John stood for 
love, but John cannot love the soul out of death into life. 
Paul stood for doctrine, but doctrine cannot lift the soul 
out of death into life. The name of Confucius does not 
save. The contents of Confucius' name is human 



SALVATION BY CHRIST 99 

wisdom, and China, who has sat at his feet for centuries, 
is only just awakening at the dawn of human civilization. 
Confucianism does not save. Buddha was the son of a 
prince or king. He brought his thoughts to his people. 
The Buddhist countries are in a trance waiting for the 
kiss of the prince, when they shall awake to salvation. 
The name of Mohammed does not save. The nations that 
have fastened themselves to his name are on the lowest 
round of civilization. The name of God does not save; 
the name of God is like a mirror — when I speak of it 
each one sees his own image in his own mind. It is a 
matter of scientific observation again and again in mis- 
sion fields, when you speak the name of God, the heathen 
thinks of his god. When you speak the name of Jesus 
Christ, he takes his salvation from your God. There is 
no other name under heaven by which you can be saved. 
The air is full of electricity, but the trolley-wheel wan- 
ders along in the air and gets no power. When it touches 
the wire, the power comes. The name of Jesus Christ 
is the divinely insulated wire, through which pours the 
power of God's creating hand. 

The name of the Father does not save. Christ said, 
" No man comes unto the Father but by me." He knew 
the Father better than we know him. " I am the way, 
and the truth, and the life/' The fact is, that, until men 
are born of the spirit through faith in Jesus Christ, the 
Fatherhood of God has no personal meaning. We can- 
not understand the Father outside the Son; and so the 
name of God and the name of the Father and the name of 
Jehovah and the names of faithful men throughout the 
centuries become simply a huge Tower of Babel from 
which we fall through confounded names. There is no 
name under heaven given among men except the name of 
Jesus Christ of Nazareth. 



1/ 



100 HONEST DEBTORS 

Salvation means today what it meant then — restora- 
tion of waste powers ; filling out of a divine ideal ; lifting 
the man from without the gate inside the gate, where he 
thanks God. 

Dwight Hillis, a prominent minister in Brooklyn, tells 
us that some years ago, a man came into his meeting, 
and at the end of the meeting walked down the steps with 
him and told him this story: His parents died when he 
was four years of age, and he was adopted by a Western 
farmer when he was eight. The boy took a son's place 
and grew up to manhood on the farm. The old farmer 
said to him, " If you stay with me, I will make you my 
heir." The young man stayed with him, and presently 
married, and went off on his wedding trip. While he was 
gone the old farmer got another man to do his work, an 
older man. When the young man came back the older 
man stayed on. One day while out working in the field 
together, the young man ordered the older man to do 
something. The old man was sullen and quick-tempered. 
He picked up a pitchfork and started toward the young 
man, who was trying to guard himself. By some acci- 
dent the old man fell on the pitchfork and was killed. 
The young man was tried for murder. The farmer's 
other heirs, who wanted the young man out of the way, 
employed able lawyers, by whose efforts he was convicted 
and sentenced to twenty years' imprisonment. One day a 
minister came to see him in the prison, and explained to 
him the way of Jesus Christ. He accepted it. A few 
days after his wife wrote that she had sued for divorce 
and was going to marry again. He fought out the strug- 
gle inside the prison walls, living an upright, consistent 
Christian life. When he went out of the prison he car- 
ried with him an invention. He perfected it and put it 
on the market, and is today a wealthy man. He found 



SALVATION BY CHRIST 101 

salvation in the name of Jesus Christ — recovery of him- 
self, a life set free to do its best. 

Salvation means today precisely what it meant eighteen 
hundred years ago, by the Beautiful Gate. It means a 
cripple made whole by God's power. It means a burden 
made into a burden-bearer. And Peter stands between 
the Christ and the cripple, as the church stands between 
the Christ and the crippled world, speaking, acting, living 
the name of Jesus Christ. There is salvation in no other. 

My brother, my sister, have you so lived and spoken 
the name of Jesus Christ that to your certain knowledge 
one soul has been saved because of you? If not, are you 
yourself saved? 



XI 

THE CHRIST-TYPE 

" Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and per- 
ceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marvelled ; 
and they took knowledge of them that they had been with Jesus." — 
Acts 4 : 13. 

A man is known by the company he keeps, not by the 
company that keeps him. Character depends upon con- 
tent, and not upon circumstances. The staves of a barrel 
are held in place by circumstances called hoops. They 
are something that stand around the outer side. But the 
character of a barrel is determined by its contents; not 
by what holds it, but by what it holds. So the character 
of man is determined not by outside pressure but by in- 
side choice. Napoleon I was imprisoned on St. Helena 
for many months. He did not die an Englishman. 
Joseph was kept in Egypt for many years, suffering in 
the prison, and serving in the palace. He did not die an 
Egyptian; he kept the fires of memory burning on the 
altars of the soul, and welcomed his Hebrew father and 
brothers when they came to the land of the Nile, and on 
his dying bed pledged his descendants to carry his body 
back to his birthplace. Moses was kept for forty years 
in Egypt and for forty years in Midian, but he became 
neither an Egyptian nor a Midianite. He lived through 
all the years and died a Hebrew, loyal to the faith of his 
fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 

It is nothing but cowardice for a man to plead circum- 
stances for having a rotten character. The building 
102 



THE CHRIST-TYPE 103 

material in the great workshop of Nature, dealt out to 
every form of life, is the same. You can easily tell the 
difference between the oak tree and the maple, between 
the dog and the man who are standing under the tree, 
but no living man can tell the difference between the raw 
material that goes into the tree and the dog and the man. 
This raw material is uniform for all forms of life. The 
scientific man calls the raw material protoplasm. It looks 
like the white of an egg. It is made of carbon, nitrogen, 
hydrogen, and oxygen. You stand by the work-bench 
and see Nature give out to the workman that makes the 
maple tree a bit of raw material, another workman a bit 
of raw material precisely like it, and another workman a 
bit of raw material like both of them, all out of the same 
bin ; and one workman makes a tree, another a dog, and 
another a man, out of the same material. 

The raw material that goes into different types of 
civilization is the same. God hath made of one all 
nations of the earth. The protoplasm of humanity is 
made up of intelligence, sensibilities, and will, and these 
three elements enter into every bit of human nature, and 
human nature is shaped by that to which it surrenders it- 
self. Now and then come great men into the world. The 
type of human nature in India yields to Buddha, and you 
have Buddhism; the type of human nature in China yields 
to Confucius, and you have Confucianism : Arabia yields 
its type to Mohammed, and you have Mohammedanism. 
The modern world yields itself to Jesus Christ, and you 
have Christianity. Let a child yield itself to Buddha, 
and you will have a Buddhist; yield itself to Confucius, 
and you will have a Confucian ; to Mohammed, and you 
will have a Mohammedan. The raw material is the same 
in the Buddhist, the Mohammedan, the Confucian, and 
the Christian — intellect, sensibilities, will— but a man's 



104 HONEST DEBTORS 

character is determined by what he yields himself to, 
what he is willing to hold in his will. You tell us a barrel 
that is filled with flour is called a flour-barrel, another 
one is called a sugar-barrel, another a molasses-barrel, 
another a whisky-barrel. So a man's character depends 
upon what he holds willingly. Character is simply the 
mark on the surface. A man yields his life to a per- 
sonality, to a principle, to a purpose, to a truth. These 
engrave themselves on the man's memory, on his will, on 
his affections, and to whatever that man touches he trans- 
mits the character that he has received from the person 
and the purpose and the thought and the truth he has 
yielded himself to. 

So a man is known by the company he keeps, no mat- 
ter what keeps him. The captured Boers are being car- 
ried to St. Helena, but captivity does not mean confor- 
mation of character. They may live in St. Helena for 
years, they will die Boers. 

" These Men Have Been With Jesus " 

These wise men in Jerusalem took knowledge of Peter 
and John that they had been with Jesus. How did they 
know it? By certain characteristics that they found re- 
peating themselves in the lives of these men. The web 
stretched in the Gobelin tapestry looms in Paris depends 
for its pattern upon the oil painting behind the workmen, 
the mosaic in the walls of St. Peter's in Rome depends 
for its pattern in a like manner. In the web of life and 
mosaic of character we are made by the ideals we yield 
ourselves to. 

These men, the text says, were unlearned and ignorant 
men — better rendered, " unlettered and private individ- 
uals. " They were not men of letters. Their accusers 
were. But what are letters? Letters are the cans hold- 



THE CHRIST-TYPE 105 

ing preserved thought that has been put up by other 
thinkers. They were not men of letters, they were 
thinkers. There is a large difference between a retail 
dealer of other men's thoughts, and a thinker. Thinkers 
are rare. Scholars are plenty. Scholars are simply 
dealers in what other men have thought and put into 
letters. The man of letters and of culture is the man 
who has mastered other men's thoughts. Letters are 
simply the goatskins of Palestine; they hold the vintage 
of past years. Peter and John had come from the Prom- 
ised Land with purple clusters of their own thinking; 
they were treading the wine-press of thought alone. 
They were putting the vintage of their thought into old 
forms, and the forms were stretched and cracking. And 
men took note that they had been with Jesus Christ. 

Jesus was not a scholar, he was a thinker. That 
amazed his enemies. They wondered where he got his 
knowledge, for he had never studied letters. No, but he 
had studied thought, and thought is more than letters. 
Letters simply preserve thought. Knowledge comes 
through letters. Wisdom comes through life. You 
never become wise by thinking other men's thoughts. 
You become very knowing, but not wise. And these 
men were not knowing men, they were wise men. They 
had the wisdom of life. 

They were ignorant men. The Greeks said they were 
idiots. The Greeks thought all wisdom and knowledge 
were in the hands of their public teachers, their political 
masters, but they found this did not hold then, and it 
does not hold now. 

Free Thinking and Free Speaking 

They took knowledge of them, first, of their boldness — 
that is, better rendered, freeness of thought and freeness 

H 



106 HONEST DEBTORS 

of expression. The characteristic of Jesus Christ as a 
teacher, was absolute freedom of thought and freedom 
of speech. Jesus Christ was the greatest free thinker the 
world has ever seen. There is no fallacy like the fallacy 
of supposing that free thinking means irreligious think- 
ing. Freedom of thought means freedom in every field 
of thought, and the man who puts a barb-wire fence 
around religious thought, shows his own limitations. 
Men are made to think in all directions, up toward God 
and down toward daily life, and out toward humanity. 
Freedom of thinking means freedom of thinking in all 
directions. Our street-cars run on certain streets and 
avenues, and depend upon the tracks for their right of 
way. They cannot run along streets that are not tracked. 
A great deal of self-styled freedom of thought is about 
as free as this; it cannot get off and go ahead. It 
has laid down certain lines of prejudice, and it goes 
back and forth, up and down. Christ was as free as the 
birds of the air, as free as the currents of the sea, and 
there was no field of thought that he did not press his 
pilgrim feet upon. He took up the literature of his 
people and thought it through freely. He said, u Moses 
said unto you . . . but I say." " Moses' law was given 
you on account of the hardness of your hearts; but this 
was not so in the beginning, ,, and Jesus unfolded the 
literature of his people with freedom. He thought on all 
subjects of God and man, of heaven and hell, of duty and 
destiny. And he was a free speaker, too. That cost him 
his life. A little more withholding of speech, and he 
would have lived to be seventy years of age. But one 
would better die free than to live a bondman. Free 
thought without free speech is useless. Free thought is 
like the fire — it needs a draught to keep it going, and if 
you shut off the draught of speech, free thought dies. 



THE CHRIST-TYPE 107 

Did Jesus Christ draw a circle around certain forms of 
thought, and say, " Think these and no more " ? Never ! 
He said : " I have many things to say unto you, but you 
cannot bear them now. I will send you another Advo- 
cate, and when he has come, he will guide you to all the 
truth. He shall take the things of mine and show them 
unto you. He shall glorify me." 

And these men who were with the Master three years, 
had caught the secret of free thought and free speech. 
The distinguishing mark of the Master was on the men. 

My brother, there is no subject in the universe that is 
barred to freedom of thought. God is not even too 
sacred to be the subject of thought. " Come, let us rea- 
son together, saith the Lord, and though your sins be as 
scarlet, they shall be whiter than snow." 

There was another mark of the Master that came out 
in the disciples, and that was their sympathy. 

Sympathy for Men 

Not freedom of thought for thought's sake, not free- 
dom of speech for speech's sake, but freedom of thought 
and freedom of speech for man's sake. The heart is 
more than the head. Jesus Christ had compassion on the 
multitude. Some of you boast of your freedom of 
speech; you had better muzzle it. No man has a right 
to strike a blow in the face of a friend for the sake of 
showing that he can speak his mind. Truth is not for 
truth's sake, but for man's sake. God did not make a 
truth in his image and likeness, but he made man in the 
image and likeness of God ; and always in your freedom 
of thought and speech, study whether you are going to 
help or hurt when you speak your mind. The highway- 
man on the street has no right to knock a man down, to 
show his superiority to the law. 



108 HONEST DEBTORS 

" I am the way, and the truth, and the life." The 
way to the truth, and truth for a ministry of life. These 
men when they saw the man by the wayside, spoke to 
help, and not to hurt him. Let the free wind blow over 
every field of thought, but be sure it is a south wind laden 
with the sunshine of sympathy, and not a north wind 
keen-edged with the frost of destruction. Free thought 
and free speech are crushing icebergs in an arctic sea; 
sympathy is a Gulf Stream that melts the ice and makes 
it minister health and strength to a waiting world. 

The characteristic of Jesus Christ's teaching is its sym- 
pathetic temper and tone. 

They took knowledge of them that they had been with 
Jesus. Ye are judged by the words of your mouth. 
" God, make the words of my mouth and the meditation 
of my heart acceptable in thy sight, my strength and 
my Redeemer." And the mark of the Master and the 
typemark of the disciples was Christian help. Sympathy 
is marvelous, and yet there is no danger so subtle as that 
of developing sympathy for the sake of enjoying it. I 
read a book the other day, and as I read, my heart 
swelled, my throat contracted, and the quick tears came. 
I laid down the book. I breathed a silent prayer of 
praise that God had enabled the man to write a book that 
could stir my sympathy. I then thought, How much 
better is the world for the fact that you are stirred? 
How much better is the world for that quickening of the 
heart, for that gathering of quick tears, for that flash of 
sympathy? That is the test. 

Another remarkable thing about Jesus Christ is that he 
helped men. There is no sense in getting up steam unless 
you can use it in machinery. There is no use in divert- 
ing Niagara unless you can pour the diverted water on 
a turbine wheel that will generate force and fire; and 



THE CHRIST-TYPE 109 

there is just as much use in arousing your sympathy and 
then letting it run to waste. 

" Come with me/' said a friend, " down to the theater. 
I was there last night, and it was the best play I ever saw. 
I cried more than half the way through." So we go to 
the theater, and read novels, to stir our jaded tastes. 
That is not the mark of Christ. Christ is a sympathetic 
high priest, but he can be touched by the meanest of us. 
His words are charged with a high purpose, that makes 
the world better. 

How much better is the world today because you are in 
it? Because you think freely, speak boldly, and sympa- 
thize warmly ? That is the mark of a Christian. 

India, stretching her hands out in famine and want, 
does not reach toward the Buddhist or Confucian, but 
toward the sympathetic helpfulness of a Christian civili- 
zation. 

Communion with God 

Another mark of the Master that came out was that of 
prayer. God is the author of thought. If you would be 
a free thinker, know God. God is the giver of speech. 
If you would be a free speaker, know God. God is the 
author of sympathy. If you would sympathize correctly, 
know God. God is the source of power for helpfulness. 
Prayer is knowing God. These men came from a place 
of prayer when they helped the man. They were going 
to a place of prayer. Instantly they were set free from 
their bondage, they started for the church, and all prayed. 
The Master was a man of prayer. While the world 
slept, Jesus prayed. While the world waited, Jesus 
prayed. Before he healed the leper, before he raised the 
dead, Jesus prayed. That is a characteristic, and the 
man who bears the type-mark of Christ is a man of 



110 HONEST DEBTORS 

prayer. He did not teach the philosophy of prayer — he 
prayed. The child breathes for years before he under- 
stands the philosophy of breathing. There must be no 
refusing to do things till you know how. Understanding 
the philosophy of doing a thing comes from doing the 
thing. Prayer is the mark of Christianity; no man can 
be a Christian and not pray. 

Prayer is the evidence of a new life begun. The child 
is born. The doctor bends over it with listening ear to 
find out if it lives. What is the proof? It breathes. 
Stand by the bedside of the dying man. He is dead ; his 
breath has stopped. Bend over the soul and listen. The 
Christ life has gone, he has stopped praying. Prayer is 
the secret of communion with the unseen God. 

It is a custom in college life for men to hold anniver- 
saries of the year in which they graduated, five, ten, 
fifteen, twenty, twenty-five years past. Some months ago 
a class gathered in Yale College that had been separated 
for twenty years. Five and twenty men were gathered 
around a table in a room, the door opened, a man entered, 
bowed in form, leaning heavily on a staff, his face deeply 
furrowed, his hair whitened. He looked into the face of 
one and another. No man knew him. His lines of life 
had gone out at right angles from them, and he had not 
seen one of them for twenty years. He had searched the 
world for health, the burden of disease had bowed him 
down, taken the vitality out of his life. He spoke to one 
and another of his classmates, calling them by name. No 
one knew him. Without speaking his name, he stepped 
to the door and beckoned, and came in again leaning on 
the strong arm of a boy eighteen years of age, and when 
they saw him, with one consent they spoke the father's 
name. The type was repeated in the boy. 

Men and women, do you bear the type-mark of Jesus 



THE CHRIST-TYPE 111 

Christ? When men see you, do they think of the Mas- 
ter ? Does the world see in you the reproduction of that 
life of freedom of thought ; that freedom of speech con- 
cerning the things that are seen and heard ; that matchless 
sympathy that has compassion on the multitude, and 
mighty helpfulness that lifts the weary into the arms of 
God ; the constant communion that is at home in the arms 
of the Father? There is no danger to the Christian re- 
ligion so long as the Christ-type is perpetuated. 



XII 

CONQUEST FOR CHRIST 

" The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty 
through God to the pulling down of strongholds; casting down 
reasonings, and every high thing that exalte th itself against the 
knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the 
obedience of Christ/' — 2 Corinthians 10 : 4, 5 

Our text has a great historic background which gives 
form to Paul's thought ; a study of that will give under- 
standing of the text. From the years 90 to 48 B. C. the 
history of Rome reads like the story of San Francisco 
during the earthquake, or of Paris during the Commune : 
Turmoil, tumult, overthrow, destruction; a social war, 
two civil wars, three wars with Mithridates, two revolu- 
tions; provinces in rebellion, Rome in revolution; liberty 
perished, but power persisted. During this period piracy 
flourished; the seas, swept of Roman ships, were given 
over to pirates. Cilicia was the headquarters of the pirate 
hordes. The gulfs that gashed the shores were given 
over to building and repairing pirate vessels. The heights 
were fortified, forts crowned the crests of the mountains, 
ships swept the seas. The sea between Cyrene, Crete, and 
Smyrna was called the Golden Gulf, so rich was the har- 
vest. Pirate vessels were decorated with purple and fine 
linen, adorned with gold, oars were plated with silver. 
The pirates controlled a thousand vessels, plundered four 
hundred cities, robbed temples. Rome cared little for her 
Greek cities; but when the freebooters of the sea seized 
Roman corn-ships, free corn at Rome was impossible, 
112 



CONQUEST FOR CHRIST 113 

riots began, the Senate acted. Pompey was given supreme 
power, five hundred galleys were voted him, a hundred 
thousand foot-soldiers, five thousand horse, and unlimited 
credit.' He swept the seas, burned the docks, sunk the 
ships, captured one hundred and twenty cities, ten thou- 
sand prisoners, and pulled the forts to pieces. 

Saul of Tarsus (Paul) was born in Cilicia. The strug- 
gle was modern history when, a boy, he had seen the 
ruins of docks, the w r recks of ships, the crumbling walls 
of forts on the hillsides and tops. The history set the 
molds into which he poured the molten metal of his 
thought. To Paul the Christian religion was a struggle; 
he must be a good soldier of Jesus Christ, he must put on 
the whole armor of God, he must keep his body under. 
The Christian religion is not the translation of the teach- 
ings of Christ from one language into another, but the 
putting the spirit of Christ into life. 

The struggle with the pirates was inside the Republic. 
Pompey did not stand on the frontier and beat back 
invaders. The pirates were not flies and mosquitoes 
bringing death from the outside world, but bacilli and 
germs spreading death inside the body. 

The Pirates of the Heart 

As Paul entered more deeply into the Christian life 
he learned the meaning of the Master's teaching, " Your 
enemies shall be those of your own household. " Not 
merely members of the same circle, but in the heart, 
memory, mind, imagination, will. Every Christian is a 
soldier and a pirate. The struggle is a civil war. Every 
soul is a Cilicia and a Mediterranean. The heights are 
fortified by evil; the sea is like the Atlantic during the 
Civil War, a meeting-place for men of the same blood 
under different flags. The pirates of Cilicia were not 



114 HONEST DEBTORS 

barbarians from beyond the border, but Romans in train- 
ing and citizenship, and so more dangerous. 

Saul of Tarsus had little trouble doing good as a Jew. 
The laws of life were very definite, fasting, paying tithes, 
keeping fast- and feast-days. It is easy to do right when 
right doing is obedience to law. He reached perfection 
according to the righteousness of the law. He met 
Christ and asked, " Lord, what wilt thou have me to 
do ? " Then he found a law in his members contrary to 
the law in his mind. Custom hardens into law, life over- 
rides custom, and the struggle is on. When you are 
dealing with a reservoir and canals, you can regulate the 
outflow ; that is Judaism. But when you deal with clouds 
and rivers, the flood overflows the banks; that is Chris- 
tianity. Life more abundantly calls for deeper and 
wider channels. There are a great many Jewish en- 
gineers in the Christian camp, men who try to regulate 
the new life by canals and gates, instead of furnishing 
machinery for the new power. Paul found himself bound 
to a body of death; he never saw it in the dim light of 
Judaism. The sea swarmed with pirates, the heights 
were fortified, his temples were sacked, his corn-ships 
seized, and famine threatened. He could not sit at home 
and muse, he must seek the enemy and fight. 

The same thought of struggle comes to us in Christ's 
parable of the field. " A sower went forth to sow." 
Sowing is a peaceful task, but seeds fight the soil day 
and night. Conquered, they die ; conquering, they bring 
in great treasures of golden grain. Here is the field ; the 
Sower buys it with his treasure ; the field is conscious and 
yields to the new owner. In a passion of surrender the 
life-field gives up every part : 

Here, Lord, I give myself away, 
'Tis all that I can do. 



CONQUEST FOR CHRIST 115 

The soil gives itself, the Master gives the seed; the 
Master's gift means nothing unless the surrender is 
actual. The Sower sows his seed by the wayside, on 
the path that crosses the field. The field refuses to yield. 
" But you are mine, I bought you, you are a part of the 
field, you surrendered," says the Sower. " True, but to 
be used as a path. I have given up this part of my life 
to men and women for years, custom makes rights, I 
cannot take back what I have given, there is enough for 
you and men too. I do belong to you, but have my 
reserve rights; this is a path, always has been, always 
will be/' says the field. The Sower sows, and the birds 
feed. The Sower calls on conscience to guard the path, 
the world pushes conscience one side; he returns, strug- 
gles, finally bars the path, but it has cost many a struggle. 
Then the Master calls on repentance to drive the plow 
through the path, but the packed soil rebels. The plow 
skates, slides, repentance insists, and the path is con- 
quered, the seed covers the path and no scar is left, but 
it was a sore struggle. Oh ! men ! women ! are there no 
paths across the fair field of your surrendered lives, has 
the Sower full right of way? 

Yonder is a bit of stony ground, thin soil with an under- 
run of stone, solid stone with a veneer of soil. Because 
it is thin it is hot at noon, cold by night, muddy in rain, 
dry in drought, always open to every seed, and a grave- 
yard to all seeds. The Sower wastes one year, then un- 
loads loam and makes soil, and the thin soil protests, 
" I have a right to the sun and the rain and the seed." 
" But I bought you, you gave yourself up to me," said 
the Sower. " True, but not to be buried from the sun and 
sight of man. Use me as I am, not make me what I 
ought to be." But the new soil is spread on, the new 
seeds sown, and the added soil is a ladder up which the 



116 HONEST DEBTORS - 

seeds carry the hidden soil into the sunlight at harvest; 
but it cost a struggle. 

Yonder is a thorn-patch; for years it has nourished 
the brush and now welcomes the new seed. The thorn- 
patch soil is liberal, nothing narrow about it, it keeps 
open house to all forms of life. But the thorn-bush has 
been there a long time, and the new seed is starved out. 
The Sower brings an ax, a root-puller, fire, and the soil 
protests. " You have no right to destroy my output, it is 
dear to me." " True, but you are mine, you yielded 
when I asked you." " Yes, but I didn't mean this. I 
want my old ways and your new ways. I am like an 
immigrant, I want the benefit of the new kingdom and the 
customs of the old." But the Sower persists, ax, root- 
puller, and fire do their work, and the years pass. Now 
we see a field covered with a carpet of verdure, burdened 
with a harvest, not a memory of path, stony soil, or 
thorn-patch, " no wrinkle, blemish, or any such thing " ; 
but it cost struggle. For whether it be Pompey and the 
pirates, or the Sower and the seed, it is civil war ; pirate, 
soil, and human heart do not take kindly to the highest 
things of life and law. 

Christ comes into the life, the man surrenders, but 
memory asserts itself, imagination reproduces engravings 
of the old paintings, the will rebels, and the struggle is 
on. A man is quite a Christian in the home, wife and 
children help there ; but in the store, on the street, the en- 
vironment changes, and he forgets. He is kind in the 
home, to his own flesh and blood, but unkind in the 
market-place, unjust in the store, dishonest in trade, path, 
stony ground, thorny ground. It takes many a struggle 
to conquer the whole life for Christ; to do unto others 
as ye would that others should do unto you, to love as 
Christ loves. Demas still loves the present age, Absalom 



CONQUEST FOR CHRIST 117 

still stands by the city gate and organizes rebellion against 
the kingdom. Seas still swarm with pirates, heights are 
fortified, the struggle is on. 

It is easy to live a religion that piles canned goods on 
the shelves of memory, hard to live a religion that sows 
living seeds on every part of the life. When I was a 
lad I used to cut out the pictures from Godey's " Lady's 
Book," hold them up to the window, press a thin sheet 
of paper against the picture, and trace the lines. That 
was easy ; but when I tried to draw from still life, repro- 
duce the form of an animal, I failed. It is easy to trace 
a religion that is all law and leaves much of life un- 
touched, but hard to reproduce a life like the Christ-life. 
It is easy to pour out the soul in the confessional, be told 
of certain definite duties, take a sacrament that guaran- 
tees salvation, but hard to reproduce the life of Christ in 
terms of human nature. 

A man takes a contract to erect a building; the limits 
are drawn, the material specified, the conditions written. 
When the cellar is dug it stays dug ; when the stones are 
placed they stay in place, carved, they retain the form 
chiseled on them ; the nails stay where driven. But you 
take a contract to build a character, following the lines 
of Christ's life. The dirt shoveled out of the cellar gets 
back while you sleep, the cellar-wall caves in, the shovel 
finds a bank of quicksand, the chiseled stones change 
form, shift from north to south wall, the nails driven in 
the floor prefer the ceiling; you are dealing with living 
forces, mortgaged to habit, and you get many a blister 
and backache before you complete the contract. 

Help in the Civil War of the Soul 

Can a man conquer the pirates ? Alone, no. " Pom- 
pey, can you conquer the pirates ? " " Alone, no." 



118 HONEST DEBTORS 

" Well, here is an army, a navy, a treasure, and behind 
you Rome." " Yes ! " Listen ! " We are more than 
conquerors through Christ who strengthens us." " Lo, 
I am with you always." Christ is the Captain of our 
salvation, and he said, " I will send you another Com- 
forter." The Spirit who came upon Christ filled him, 
drove him; through him he was raised from the dead 
and declared to be the Son of God. The power that 
made the world and guides the stars is behind us. What 
were the heights of Cilicia and the ships of piracy when 
Rome girded Pompey, and what are the strongholds of 
sin in the soul when God makes bare his arm ? 

Our Cilicia is in our soul, our sea is in our own heart. 
Our struggle is to pull down every reasoning that is 
contrary to the knowledge of God. We have the knowl- 
edge of God in the Bible. There we have the record of 
what God spoke in many ways and places, and, above all 
else, the utterance of the mind of God in the life of 
the Christ. 

We are to lead every thought into captivity to the 
obedience of Christ. Can a man control his thoughts? 
If he cannot he is not to be trusted. The motorman 
who cannot control his thoughts is not safe on the car as 
driver. The chauffeur who cannot control his thoughts 
is unsafe. The stenographer who cannot control her 
thoughts when dictated to loses her job. The typist 
who cannot control her thoughts is sent home. The 
typesetter who cannot follow copy is sent from the office. 
The student who cannot control his thoughts cannot 
graduate. If you lack power of control over your own 
thoughts you are not worth bothering with in any 
department of life. 

The man who has a mighty passion has no trouble 
controlling his thoughts. A central purpose controls the 



CONQUEST FOR CHRIST 119 

mind as the sun masters the earth. Put Christ first, 
honestly first, always first, and the thoughts will come 
trooping after as the cars follow the locomotive at the 
pull of its power. 

What the World Expects of the Church 

The Christian has not only to fight with the world with- 
in, but he lives in relation with other men. He is a part 
of a civilization. He is the salt of the earth, the light of 
the world. In an empire he must render to Caesar what is 
Caesar's ; in a republic he is a part of the Caesar, he is one 
thread in a mighty web, one brick in a great wall, a part 
of a mighty government. He is responsible for his vote, 
and for seeing to it that the man he helps to choose does 
his duty. He cannot live out of relation with others. He 
is a part of the environment of every man he meets. A 
man might as well try to rear a child in good health and 
not insist upon pure milk, as to hope to rear a family de- 
cently and not see to it that the state is decent. " No man 
liveth unto himself/' no man can. Dives tried and failed. 
The seed puts its life and organization into every bit of 
soil, sun, and rain it can. " The seed are the children of 
the kingdom." Organization expresses life, perpetuates 
life, guards life. The church is organized Christianity for 
the present age. It is our duty to sweep the seas of 
pirates, to storm the heights, to bring into captivity to 
Christ every thought of man. The Christian religion 
has molded a language to spiritual expression, wrought 
out music, fashioned architecture, mastered art. Its next 
field is government. We need the salt of righteousness in 
civic affairs, the light of righteousness on the highways 
of business and the seas of commerce. 

The Chicago " Interior " tells us what the world ex- 
pects of the church. 



120 HONEST DEBTORS 

When the world assumes an expectant attitude toward the 
church, her burden of obligation can hardly be shirked, thinks 
an editorial writer in the Chicago " Interior." A prominent Chicago 
attorney is quoted as saying : " At our club every day I hear 
politicians and business men talking of public corruption in the 
city, and over and over they keep asking, ' What are the churches 
going to do about it ? ' They're waiting for the churches to lead 
off." The meaning of such speeches, as this writer sees it, is that 
" the world has come to expect of the church leadership in the 
destruction of civic evils." Will the church meet the expectation? 
he asks, and he goes on to observe : 

" It is a terrific thing for the church to be expected. Its duty 
is serious enough when it has to thrust itself on a world that 
doesn't want it. But when the world is wanting it and waiting 
for it, then the responsibility ought to make the church quake. 

"If it fails then, it squanders opportunity, and trades an offered 
respect for an earned contempt. It not only disappoints God, but 
betrays humanity. 

" Precise folks dispute the old proverb, ' The voice of the 
people is the voice of God.' But nobody can dispute this amend- 
ment: ' The expectation of the people is the voice of God.' An 
expectant world is a divine challenge. 

" The church's tasks multiply all the while and grow harder. 
Very recently nobody would have dreamed of looking to the church 
for relief from oppressions of wicked public officials and thieving 
political rings. Its sphere was supposed to be on the opposite side 
of life from politics. 

" But under push of moral indignations which precedent could 
not confine, the church here and there, once and again, has been 
driven to try its mettle fighting greed and vice. 

" And in such conflicts the church has discovered to itself and 
to the world a new possibility. The men who love graft and 
vice have learned a new fear. The men who hate them have 
got a new hope. Both the fear and the hope point to the church. 

* The reward of what little the church has already done for 
civic and social reform is this — it is expected to do more." 

The writer turns to consider some of the reasons why the world 
expects the church to lead in the direct attack upon wrong-doing — 
why " men of the world have learned so soon to wait until the 
church leads." Thus : 



CONQUEST FOR CHRIST 121 

" The church has something in it which lasts. 

44 The worst defeat of reform in the cities and towns has always 
been that the reforming determination oozes out so quickly. Civic 
societies are organized and go in for a while with mighty vim. 
But soon leaders and followers together are tired of the trouble; 
they quietly drop out and slink away. The organization goes to 
pieces, and the rascals come back. But the church hasn't gone 
to pieces yet. It has outlasted every strain that has come on it. 
It sags sometimes, but it always recovers itself. If the church 
once gets roused enough to set its sentinels out, the foe won't slip 
back into the old stronghold unobserved. The fighting army will 
never be quite depleted; a nucleus at least will always be under 
drill. 

" The church, when true to itself, is really for the whole 
people. 

" The dread that gets on the nerves of everybody who takes 
active part against public evils is the dread of some cheap and 
narrow selfishness using the overturn of old abuses as oppor- 
tunity to establish new. Or where there is no deliberate plot of 
self-seeking, sheer lack of understanding is apt to serve only a part 
of the people rather than all. 

" But the church reaches up and down, near and far, through 
all conditions of people. It has a sense of sympathy and an instinct 
for justice at its heart. Better than any other force in the world, 
it can be trusted to hold the balances level between man and man. 
There is surer to be fair play, brotherhood, union of all classes, 
sincerity, true patriotism, where the church is dominant. Tired of 
pretenses and partialities, the politician feels new confidence when 
he follows the church. 

" The church can present a solid front, 

" That is a new revelation to the modern world. Men outside 
had been so used to the quarreling of Christians over theological 
matters that the divisions of the church were their byword. No- 
body suspected any force of combination inside church lines. And 
the present world wants combination. 

" But of late when the bugle blows for a moral issue, the modern 
church in a trice quits its disputes and closes ranks. The world 
is amazed. But the world is immensely impressed. Solidarity 
is the one invaluable political asset. If the church can show it, of 
course the politicians will wait for its leadership. 



122 HONEST DEBTORS 

" The church has Jesus Christ 

" The world knows Jesus was brave — that he didn't fear the 
face of man. It wants that courage now, and it hopes to find it 
in Christ's followers. Jesus would stand for the right, no matter 
what it cost. Amid the hesitations and fears and evasions of many 
who do not want righteousness enough to pay the price, the world 
realizes that free and fearless self-sacrifice equal to the emergency 
is going to be found only among such as Christ has touched with 
his spirit. Hence it waits for the church." 

By the church we mean the men and women who have 
heard the call of Christ, have given themselves to Christ, 
and propose to pull down strongholds, cast down reason- 
ings that exalt themselves against the knowledge of God, 
and bring into captivity every thought to the obedience 
of Christ. 

We expect the scholar will translate the words of Christ 
into the language we can understand, so that through our 
mother tongue we can get the mind of Christ. We expect 
Christian men and women to translate the life of Christ 
into daily duty, into literature, art, architecture, music, 
business, pleasure, government, so that the will of God 
may be done on earth as it is done in heaven. We shape 
our clothes to our forms, our words to our thoughts ; we 
ought to shape our institutions to the Christ who is 
formed within us the hope of glory. 



XIII 
CHRIST OUR PEACE 

" He is our peace." — Ephesians 2 : 14. 

Napoleon III declared war against Germany July 15, 
1870. The treaty of peace was signed May 10, 1871, at 
Frankfort-on-the-Main. The French armies had been 
captured or crushed, Paris had surrendered. The terms 
of peace were dictated by the Germans. In land, Alsace 
and Lorraine. In money, five billion francs. The con- 
queror always dictates terms of peace. 

The Psalmist prays. " Blot out my transgressions/' 
The word transgressions means rebellions, a breaking 
away from and setting one's self against lawful authority. 
Law is the expression of will, rebellion against law is 
setting the will against will. Law is not an abstraction, 
but the will of a person for the regulation of life, and 
rebellion is setting up of the will against the will of the 
lawmaker. Rebellion means will against will. Crime is 
man's will against the will of most, phrased as law; sin 
is the human will against the will of God. 

David had rebelled against God in his sin with Bath- 
sheba, and the murder of her husband to cover the sin of 
adultery. Nathan the prophet held the mirror up to the 
King's conscience; he shrank from the sight of himself, 
cried aloud for mercy. He had sinned against God, and 
God must state the terms of peace. The iniquity of the 
sin was forgiven, but the unsheathed sword never left the 
house of David. Its blade smote the family, the hilt was 
in God's hand. 

,123 



124 HONEST DEBTORS 



Sin is Lawlessness 

Sin is rebellion against God, hoisting the black flag of 
piracy on the sea of time. If sinners had the power they 
would dethrone the Eternal. The first sin was simply 
rebellion against the will of God. Jehovah set limitations 
for man; man sought to break them down, would himself 
be one as the gods, he set his will against God's will, he 
lacked power, was banished. 

All through the centuries men have rebelled against 
God. When they knew him as God they did not glorify 
him, they became vain in their imaginations, their foolish 
hearts were darkened. When the human will rebels 
against God's will the end is vanity and darkness. We 
know where the Jordan will end when it leaves the Sea 
of Gennesaret, and we know where the stream of human 
life will end when it leaves God. 

Rebellion against God is followed by rebellion against 
the law made by men for the protection of life and 
property. Men who do not love God supremely will 
not love men as they love self. Our whole system of 
courts, prisons, policemen is a constant comment on revolt 
against law. Here and there a criminal has been caught 
and branded, but there are great herds of the unbranded, 
men who live rebellion in a quiet way, who assume to be 
the judge of laws they do not believe in — laws that have 
passed the test of the Supreme Court, but have failed at 
the bar of private judgment, so the self-elected judge 
assumes the right to violate the law. 

At dinner in the hotel a man may eat what he chooses, 
reject what does not please him; but laws are not like 
bills of fare, they are not subject to private judgment. 

G — — was a sample citizen, lenient with himself, but 
severe with others; temptations that pleased him could 



CHRIST OUR PEACE 125 

be yielded to, but other men must measure conduct with- 
standing tests that never touched him. He was highly 
indignant. A politician who did not believe in civil ser- 
vice examinations had passed one under an assumed 
name, and helped a friend who could not pass the test 
to the office — impersonated a fellow politician and gave 
him the office. He was found out, tried, declared guilty, 
served six months in jail, was met by an admiring crowd, 
escorted by a brass band, given a banquet, and elected 
alderman. A common occurrence, that of putting the 
will of one, or of a group against law when it does not 
commend itself to the judgment of the man or the group. 

Of course G was indignant, he was never tempted 

that way. 

Some months later G went to Europe, and, on his 

return, smuggled in quite a bit of imported property, 
making friends with the customs officer, getting his trunk 
through without declaration or examination. He did 
not believe in the tariff, thought it an outrage upon citi- 
zenship. He was not caught by the law, but had to face 
a woman with a conscience ; he had hoped to marry her, 
but she couldn't love where she couldn't trust. She had 
listened to his indignant speech when the politician had 
broken law he did not believe in, she saw the same flaw 
in his character he had denounced in another man far 
below him in social standing and education, ideals, and 
character. He had saved the tariff, but lost the woman. 

The peril that threatens this country is not across the 
sea, cannot be guarded against by submarines or airships, 
but is in the body itself. Preparedness against the winter 
cold will not save from death when a cancer is eating out 
the life. The danger that threatens the Republic is setting 
the private judgment against public law, rebelling against 
laws. We spend millions of dollars every year to punish 



126 HONEST DEBTORS 

men who defy law, and other millions are saved because 
the lawbreakers are not caught and punished. The man 
who obeys the first law of the Ten Commandments, puts 
God first, will have no trouble with the rest of the Deca- 
logue; the man who trifles with and disobeys that, will 
break every other law that interferes with his tastes and 
appetites. Taste is a poor test of law, desires a bad guide 
in conduct. 

Sin against God breeds crime in the State. " Sin is 
lawlessness," the mood of mind that overrides law for 
personal gain or ends, that puts the personal will against 
the corporate will of the State, or against God's will in 
the universe. Lawlessness against God is sin, against 
the State is crime, two sides of the same coin. 

The Reconciliation of Rebels 

Rebellion and peace cannot exist at the same time 
between two parties. History is but the record of sin 
against God and crime against man. Man has first 
rebelled against God and then against his fellows. First 
we must have peace between man and God, then between 
man and man. The terms of peace must be dictated by 
the God against whom we have sinned. The country 
that declares war cannot dictate peace unless it wins. 
Man declared war against God, and man has not won. 
Terms of peace must come from God. He has sent forth 
his Son as his Ambassador. " He is our peace." God is 
satisfied with him. If we will not make terms through 
him, neither would we through any ambassador. 

The Cross the Key to Peace 

I. He reconciles us to God by his Cross. The Cross is 
the key to peace. There is no reason for war on God's 
side. 



CHRIST OUR PEACE 127 

We are not reconciled to God by the miracles of Christ. 
The men who saw them were not won by them. Signs of 
power do not change the mind. Nicodemus was willing 
to accept Christ as a Teacher come from God because of 
his miracles, but the miracles did not regenerate Nico- 
demus, and without regeneration he could neither see nor 
enter the kingdom of heaven. 

Men were not reconciled to God by the parables that 
Christ taught, though never man spake like him. The 
whole body of truth that Christ taught did not save the 
men who heard. Reconciliation comes by way of the 
Cross. There Christ bore our sins in his own body. 
Bunyan was right when he made the sight of the Cross 
loose the burden of sin from the Pilgrim's back. The 
Interpreter's House was a most helpful place, but he did 
not leave his sin there. What the Cross has to do with 
the will of God we may never understand, but this we 
know, the man who meets God at the Cross of Christ 
finds peace. The will of man changes under the shadow 
of the Cross. The Cross is the expression of the will of 
God. When the will of God is accepted as the will of 
man, rebellion ends, the veil of the Temple is rent in 
twain from top to bottom, and man becomes a king and 
priest unto God. He worships where he warred. " In 
the cross of Christ I glory." Not only does the light of 
sacred story gather round it, but the light of the up- 
lifted countenance radiates from it, and " In his light we 
see light." 

Christ surrendered himself to God; when I surrender 
myself to Christ my life is hid with Christ in God. My 
thread of life is in the eye of Christ's life, and Christ is 
in the hand of God, and I am drawn after Christ into the 
pattern of God's thought. If a man will not surrender 
to Christ he would not to any needle offered by the grace 



128 HONEST DEBTORS 

of God. The trouble is not that men will not accept 
Christ ; the trouble is that they want to choose the needle 
and the pattern. If they do not believe in civil service 
they break the law, if they do not believe in customs they 
smuggle their goods in. It is the ever-old, ever-new 
spirit of anarchy, setting the will against the established 
order. Christ had peace with God because he sought to 
know and do the will of God. As God's Ambassador he 
makes like surrender the condition of peace. He is the 
way to God, the truth of God, the life of God. 

The Key to Peace with Men 

II. He is our peace with men. " He hath broken down 
the middle wall of partition." There is no higher, thicker 
wall between men today than the middle wall of partition 
between Jew and Gentile when Christ came to earth. A 
riot was started in the Temple because some men thought 
Paul had led a Gentile into the forbidden court. Paul 
lived to see Jew and Gentile members of the same church, 
baptized into the same Christ, eating at the same table the 
body of the risen Lord. Christ made of the twain one 
new man. Babel with its misunderstanding became 
Pentecost with its understanding. The creation of mat- 
ter, force, life, is child's play to the new heaven and the 
new earth. "One God, one law, one element/' and one 
body in Christ. To be in Christ is to be one with all who 
are in Christ. Digestion and assimilation change a wide 
variety of food into one personality, so Christ builds into 
one body all nations and tribes. 

When the night falls we seek our homes, sit within our 
walls, light our own lamps, but when the day comes we 
meet and mingle in the common streets flooded with the 
sunlight. Without Christ we seek our own, with Christ 
we meet and mingle with all. As all rivers share the salt 



CHRIST OUR PEACE 129 

and tides of the sea as soon as they surrender to it, so 
all men share alike in the righteousness and power of 
Christ, when they surrender to him. You cannot find 
the rivers in the sea, nor the self-like in the soul sur- 
rendered to Christ. Christ makes peace by sharing his 
peace with all who accept him. 

The Key to Peace Within 

III. He gives us peace with ourselves. " The mind is 
its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a 
hell of heaven." David could have Uriah buried, could 
compromise with conscience and marry Bathsheba, could 
repent and content Nathan, but he could not get rid of 
David. The search-light of memory kept the grave of 
Uriah always in sight, his sin was always before him, he 
did not have to turn around to see it. But David never 
found the Cross with its message of reconciliation. 

When the prodigal came to himself, he found a slave, 
not a son, was content to work for board and clothes, but 
the father Christ sketched, kissed, clothed, fed, and re- 
stored him. The food and clothes that looked so large 
to the ragged, hungry beggar were the smallest gift; 
not even the elder son with his accurate memory of an- 
other's sins could turn the father away. Think not the 
returned son spent his time recounting his sins; he had 
his father. 

In coming to himself he had memory, in coming to his 
father he had forgiveness. If the father remembers the 
sins no more forever, we need not be disturbed. God 
puts our sins behind his back; it is a long journey around 
God. He blots them out as a thick cloud; once blotted 
out they never gather again. He buries them in the 
depths of the sea ; the sea dissolves what is buried in its 
depths. 



130 HONEST DEBTORS 

Once the sour sap has entered the sweet graft the 
memory of the old flavor is destroyed. Grafted into 
Christ, the sap in the vine changes the sap in the graft, 
and the new fruit glorifies God. 

The woman caught in sin, brought to Christ for con- 
demnation, went away cleansed to sin no more. " Go 
into peace." The creature at the supper crept in a wreck, 
she went out a woman restored to purity and given power. 
The bandit on the cross began by blaspheming, ended by 
praying, and shared Christ's entry into Paradise before 
sunset. Peter fled after his denial of Christ, but was 
restored to service. Paul spent his strength fighting the 
church; Christ met him, and turned all his energies into 
glad service for the Master. It is easier to become 
friends with God and men we have wronged than with 
the self we have outraged; but Christ can do even that, 
can blot out our sins from the page of memory by filling 
that page with new thoughts, and making a palimpsest 
with a revelation written over our speculations. 

The Key to Peace with Circumstance 

IV. Christ gives us peace here and now, with God, with 
men, with self, and with surroundings. 

The slaves in Caesar's household became saints, the 
drudgery became divine. Paul in a Roman prison was 
the prisoner in the Lord. You never hear Christ mur- 
muring because of the narrowness of the carpenter's 
shop, nor Paul grumbling because he had to earn his own 
living weaving tent-cloth, complaining because chained to 
a soldier ; the chain anchored him to good fishing-ground, 
and his bonds worked out to the glory of God. " I have 
learned in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content." 
You hear no sob from Patmos. John might be bodily 
in the mines six days, but he was in the Spirit on the 



CHRIST OUR PEACE 131 

Lord's Day; the metal he found enriched the Roman 
Empire, but the visions have enriched the churches for 
centuries. John Bunyan sat in Bedford jail making 
shoe-laces for the support of his family, traveling with 
Pilgrim in spirit, at peace with God and man. 

The silver, shot through and through with heat, loses 
its dross, and finally mirrors the face of the refiner, sit- 
ting by and stirring the fire and studying the purifying 
of the metal. Many a saint has learned the lesson of 
the refiner's presence, and lost all sense of suffering in 
the face bending above the furnace. 

Salt, sand, and sawdust are crystallized into carborun- 
dum by the melting heat of the electric current, and many 
a Christian has been perfected through suffering, and has 
rejoiced in the flames that have revealed to him the Son 
of Man. 

Late in the last century a student graduated from the 
Boston University School of Theology. The first five 
years in the ministry marked him as a man of growing 
power. Then came a severe sickness which left him a 
confirmed invalid. Slowly the tide of suffering rose 
along the shores of his body ; one leg was amputated, the 
other withered, one eye failed, then the other. His joints 
stiffened and ossified, his spinal column hardened, his 
joints set, he had but the use of one arm and hand. 
Out of this prolonged Gethsemane came a book, " God's 
White Throne," a closely reasoned argument proving the 
absolute goodness of God. The island, surrounded by 
water that ebbs and flows, surges and rages, is close knit 
to the continent, far below the shifting surface is the 
untouched peace that comes of oneness with the solid 
earth. This soul, beset by suffering, found rest and peace 
that defied circumstance by yielding utterly to God as 
revealed in Jesus Christ. 



132 HONEST DEBTORS 

Love that wilt not let me go, 
I rest my weary soul in thee ; 

1 give thee back the life I owe 
That in thine ocean depths its flow 

May richer, fuller be. 

Cross that liftest up my head, 

I dare not ask to fly from thee; 

1 lay in dust life's glory dead, 

And from the ground there blossoms red 
Life that shall endless be. 



XIV 

GOD'S PURPOSE IN CHRIST 

The eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our 
Lord. — Ephesians 3 : 11. 

I have read of a man who, at the age of thirty-nine, re- 
ceived by will a fine estate and a large fortune in bonds 
and stocks. At forty a man is either a fool or a philoso- 
pher. He has found his latitude and longitude on the sea 
of time, knows the reefs and shallows, the light-houses 
and channels of port. His habits are fixed, choice has 
crystallized into character. He is captain of his own soul 
or a sailor ordered about by his appetites. This man was 
a moral fool. He had spent his years in the underworld. 
He had wasted his substance in riotous living. The 
legacy kept him from the swine and hunger that might 
have forced him home. He said, " If I had known what 
would come to me I would have prepared myself, but 
now it is too late." Plenty is not the guide to repentance. 
You do not change a colander to a pan by doubling the 
amount of liquid poured into it. The inherited fortune 
doubled the speed toward perdition. " If I had only 
known." God has not left us in ignorance of the fortune 
willed to us. His Son has declared the eternal purpose. 
He has gone to prepare a place for us in the many-man- 
sioned house of our Father. A prepared place calls for 
a prepared people. Christ prepares the place, we must 
prepare the people. Christ has sent another Comforter 
to lead us into all truth. " We are heirs of God and joint 
heirs with Jesus Christ," and must prepare ourselves for 

133 



134 HONEST DEBTORS 

what awaits us. Colleges are prepared for us, but each 
student must prepare himself before he can enter. The 
eternal purpose of God, purposed in Christ Jesus, is the 
salvation of the Gentiles. The Jews missed the meaning 
of their call and preparation. They were meant to be a 
means, not an end ; a Gennesaret sharing salvation, not a 
Dead Sea ending it. 

The Mediator of Salvation 

Christ was the mediator in creation. " God created all 
things through Jesus Christ." The created earth is given 
to all men. Christ is the mediator in salvation. The sal- 
vation is for all men in all countries, in all centuries. 

The woe of Isaiah, " Woe unto him that joineth field to 
field, that he may be alone," applies to truth as well as 
to land. The purpose of God in Christ is revealed in the 
name, " Thou shalt call his name Jesus, Saviour." In 
Doctor Johnson's days London was poorly paved and 
worse lighted. Johnson, being near-sighted, was very 
awkward upon his feet. On one occasion, having to take 
quite a long walk after dark, he hired a boy to accompany 
him with a lantern. After Johnson had stumbled along 
across half the town, and the little fellow began to won- 
der how far he would have to go before he received his 
sixpence, the lexicographer made a worse step than usual 
and fell right down, using in the fall his customary ejacu- 
lation, " God mend me." The little fellow turned with 
his lantern, and quick as a flash said : " God mend you ! 
God could more easily make a new man." 

Yes, God could more easily make a new man than re- 
deem a stumbling, bruised one. The Bible tells the story 
of a creation in a few words, the story of redemption uses 
chapters and covers centuries. " He spake, and it was 
done; he commanded, and it stood fast." In salvation 



GOD'S PURPOSE IN CHRIST 135 

the Word became flesh and tented with us. At his word 
light flashed forth, land and water separated, earth, air, 
and water swarmed with life. One breath of God is soul- 
stuff for a race. 

" The heavens are the work of thy fingers, ,, his knitting 
work. In salvation the Son emptied himself. When he 
died the earth shuddered, and graves were opened, the 
sun was darkened. On the day of Pentecost the Holy 
Spirit was poured out. In the work of salvation God put 
forth all his strength. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are 
all at work. 

Molded dust, a single breath, and mankind is created. 
A broken heart, a rent tomb, the power of the Spirit, and 
the race is saved. Creation is given to us, salvation is 
accepted by us. We must cooperate, work together with 
God, or he fails. The harvest of the field comes when 
man works with God, the harvest unto life eternal comes 
when man works out his own salvation with God working 
in him to will and to do. 

The forces of God in nature are no respecter of per- 
sons. The forces of God in grace know neither Jew nor 
Gentile. This eternal purpose of God is made known 
through the church, through men and women who have 
accepted God's purpose and are now giving themselves to 
work it out in life. 

Years ago the contractor and builder of the Masonic 
Temple in Chicago shared his plans with his wife. She 
spent her days in the office with him. He died before the 
building was finished. She carried on the work till every 
contract was fulfilled. Through his wife his manifold 
wisdom was made known. The church is the bride of 
Christ. She is to study his plans, fulfil his contracts, carry 
on his purpose, " fill out with her body what is behind- 
hand of the sufferings of Christ." 



136 HONEST DEBTORS 

On his dying bed Jesus willed his mother to Saint 
John. " He took her to his own." Christ has willed the 
world to his church. She must take the world to her own. 
Not become worldly-minded, but make the world Christ- 
minded. The church has the mind of Christ. It is her 
duty to share that mind with the world. The astronomer 
said, " I think God's thoughts after him." The church is 
to think Christ's thoughts after him. 

Sin is insanity. When the prodigal came to himself, 
he went to his father. The world, out of Christ, is an 
insane asylum. It is the work of the church to heal its 
thinking. When men think sanely they will act wisely. 
Action is incarnate thought. 

Heaven Beside the Cradle of New Souls 

This purpose of God to prepare a people for a pre- 
pared place interests the angels, principalities, and powers 
above men. Professor Newcomb declares that there is 
life in the universe outside this earth. As we study the 
work of God in this earth and note the struggle of life to 
express itself in every possible spot belonging in the uni- 
formity of nature, we may well believe that there is life 
between man and God in the heavenly places as well as 
between man and matter on the earth. The Bible deals 
with spiritual life, and teaches distinctly that there are 
angels, principalities, powers, forms of life, that belong 
in the higher order. The world is a stage on which is set 
and acted the tragedy of human life, and we are sur- 
rounded by a great cloud of witnesses. " Act well your 
part, there all the honor lies." 

Camille Flammarion, the eminent French astronomer, 
pictures the advent of a soul on another planet. This 
man whom he pictures was an astronomer. He gave 
forty years of his life to the study of one planet. When 



GOD'S PURPOSE IN CHRIST 137 

the soul stepped from the body it was instantly on the 
planet where its thoughts had been for years. In the flesh 
we can put our thoughts where we will ; we can take the 
wings of the morning and go to the uttermost parts 
of the earth; we can make our bed in hell; we can 
climb the shining heights of heaven; we can enter 
into eternity. And why should not the soul, freed from 
the burden of the body, make its way as quickly as 
thought to the place prepared for it and for which it is 
prepared? When this soul found itself on the planet of 
its choice it gathered a body. God giveth to each seed 
its own body, but he gives it through the seed. There 
are no ready-made-clothing stores for the robing of seeds. 
Each one weaves, cuts, and fits its own garments. And the 
soul builds its body of the matter in which it finds itself, 
and it is reasonable to believe that in the next adventure 
the soul will also build its body of the matter it finds. 
This man on the new planet saw a group of beings on a 
distant hilltop. He made his way across the valley and 
found them busy at prayer ; having prayed, they stopped 
and rebuked him for not praying with them. It is but a 
step from the worship of God to finding fault with men 
who worship differently. " But," he said, " I have just 
come. I did not see anything to pray for. Everything 
is quiet and peacef ul." They replied : " The God of the 
universe has made each planet responsible for the other, 
and we are responsible for the earth. Focus your eyes on 
the distant horizon/' And there arose above it, like a 
steamer lifting above the sea, the earth which he had just 
left. It was the time of the French Revolution. The 
streets of Paris were running red with blood; the prov- 
inces were shaken. 

But this man said : " All that happened long ago. The 
revolution fought itself out, and on the blood-stained 

K 



138 HONEST DEBTORS 

streets and in the provinces there is a new and better 
government." 

He looked longer and saw a house which he recog- 
nized ; standing on the steps with his back toward him a 
man was motioning to a woman in the house. The man 
turned, and he recognized himself. He followed the man 
back through youth and boyhood to infancy in his moth- 
er's arms. So, having passed from the earth, in the 
light of memory we live over again our lives in the flesh. 
" Son, remember." Not only are those who go interested 
in the earth, but unnumbered forms of life bend eagerly 
toward the earth watching the outworking of God's pur- 
pose through Christ and the church. The object of in- 
terest, then, to angels and to men who have been on the 
earth, is not the form of government, the rise and fall of 
the kingdom, the coming and going of arts and sciences, 
the accumulation of wealth, but the church through which 
God has purposed to reveal his plans in Christ. After all, 
human life is the most valuable asset on the earth, and the 
saving of life is the noblest use of one's powers. The sad 
fact about the sinking of the " Lusitania " was not the 
loss of the steamer — that could be replaced — but the loss 
of human life, which can never be replaced. Our eyes 
and thoughts are in the trenches in France ; but what in- 
terests us is the men who went out from our families, the 
lives that are dear to us, and we look at the constant 
reports of struggle and scan the lists of those who have 
fallen. That is what breaks the heart. The angels no 
longer stand by the cradles of new worlds but of new 
souls. 

What do you mean by saving souls? I mean that the 
saved one shall be on the same level as the one saving — 
that he shall be safe. Men are saved when they stand 
beside Christ, become like him, measure his strength. 



GOD'S PURPOSE IN CHRIST 139 

As we study him we find that his first thought was of 
God. " In the volume of the book it is written, * Lo, I 
come to do thy will, O God ! ' And he prayed, " Not 
my will, but as thou wilt." He knew and did the will of 
God. He thought of men ; he forgot himself. 

The Nerve of Sin 

Sin puts self first, man second, God last. The saved 
man puts God first, the other man second, and self last. 
There we have touched the nerve of sin — the choice of 
self. We stand in a garden and men and women have 
free access to all the trees of the garden except one. The 
fruit of that tree is pleasant to the eye; good for food; 
it will make one wise. Pleasant to whose eye? Why, the 
one who looks upon it. Good for food for whom? The 
one who eats it. Makes one wise — what one? The one 
who takes of it. And so the first man turned from the 
window through which he could see God and looked 
into a mirror to study his own face. The window and 
the vision of God is salvation. The mirror and the study 
of self is sin. 

At the end of forty years the pilgrimage to Israel 
ended. The desert-bred men stood at the threshold of a 
new country. The military order forbade the taking of 
loot. Achan saw a Babylonian garment, shekels of silver, 
and wedge of gold. Looking about, he saw that no one 
watched him. He stole the property and buried it in the 
floor of his own tent. The next day a detachment of the 
army was defeated. Joshua said that there was sin in the 
camp. The lot was cast and fell upon the tribe of Judah, 
upon the family of the Zarhites, upon the man Achan. 
He confessed : " I saw ; I coveted it ; I took." He turned 
the whole Hebrew movement into personal gain. That is 
sin, the use of government for self. 



140 HONEST DEBTORS 

Naaman, the captain of the Syrian hosts, had the 
leprosy. A Jewish girl, a slave, told him that there was 
a man in her country who could heal him. With a guard 
he went from Syria to Palestine, obeyed the prophet, took 
the sevenfold bath in the River Jordan, and came out 
with his flesh as the flesh of a little child. He offered to 
reward the prophet, but the prophet did not heal for 
money* Gehazi, the student of the prophet, the man in 
training to take his place, a theological student, saw the 
offered gifts and followed the Syrian captain out through 
the mountain pass, told him that the prophet had changed 
his mind, that new students called for help, and the 
Syrian gave him gold and garments. He returned to the 
seminary. The prophet said, looking into his eyes, 
"Whither, Gehazi?" " Nowhere." And the prophet 
said, " The leprosy of the Syrian is upon thee." For 
with the garments he had taken the disease. Yes, Ge- 
hazi, the theological student, perverted the prophet's 
power to personal gain. That is sin — the use of opportu- 
nity, the perversion of power, to self. 

The How of Salvation 

George Eliot tells us how a man was saved. Silas 
Marner was the victim of black ingratitude. His friend, 
who was a thief, charged him with the crime. He could 
not overcome the prejudice and left home carrying his 
loom with him, and sought a new home among strangers. 
He had lost confidence in men; he hated his kind; he 
worked early and late and saved all the money he made. 
He took up the bricks before his open fire and buried the 
gold. Night after night he drew the shades, lighted the 
lamp, lifted the bricks, and played with the gold. One 
night coming back from the sale of the cloth, he found 
that some one had robbed him. The hole was empty. Out 



GOD'S PURPOSE IN CHRIST 141 

into the storm he went. All night he ran up and down 
among the forest trees, cursing his kind. In the early 
morning he went back again to his home. The door was 
open, the floor was flooded with the rain. There was a 
gleam of yellow in front of the fireplace. His gold was 
returned. He threw himself upon the floor to find a girl 
with golden hair in a faint. He closed the door, called 
the girl back, adopted her as his daughter, lived for 
her, worked early and late, bought her books, sent her to 
school, hired a music teacher. The whole current of his 
life was changed. From living alone for self he had come 
to live for another, and then he was saved. He had come 
to live the Christ life. Counting not his life dear unto 
himself, he poured it out to make rich another life. 

One day a rich man's carriage stopped by the door. 
He, with his wife, claimed the girl to be their daughter. 
She'had wandered away and been lost years before. She 
looked at the man and woman, then at the weaver, and 
threw her arms around his neck and refused to leave him. 
He burst into tears — the first tears he had shed for years. 
Love had conquered. Then came confidence in men, love 
to God. He had lived for himself and lost. He had lived 
for another and was saved. 

What is the church ? Men and women whom Christ is 
saving by making them like himself. Putting God first, 
man second, self last. 

Angels are interested in God's purpose. God's purpose 
in Christ is made known through the church. Men are 
saved when they become like Christ. Thus they show 
forth the manifold wisdom of God. 



XV 
YOUR LIFE HID IN CHRIST 

" For ye died, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When 
Christ, who is our life shall appear, then shall ye also appear 
with him in glory." — Colossians 3 : 3, 4. 

Christ died. Let that thought sink into your minds. 
Let it control your imagination. Let it master your 
memories. Let it mold your lives. Christ died. Of that 
there can be no doubt. The fact, and the manner of his 
death are matters of history. Men who believe in his 
resurrection, believe in his death; for had he not died 
he could not have risen from the dead. Men who deny 
his resurrection believe in his death, and that his death 
was the end of his life. That he lived, no one familiar 
with history will deny. The body of literature cannot be 
accounted for by leaving it to the fishermen and the 
peasants who followed him and reported his teachings. 

When he died, he passed out from under the power 
of Rome and Judaism. After his resurrection, he did 
not appear to Roman or Jew — only to those who fol- 
lowed him. When a man is declared dead by the State, 
the State has no more knowledge of him. When men 
were drafted, during the Civil War, some bought substi- 
tutes. If a substitute was shot on the field of battle, the 
man who sent him might be drafted again. But he had 
only to convince the government that he was already dead 
to the State, that he had been drafted, and had died 
through his substitute. So far as the army was con- 
cerned, he was a dead man. To the Roman Empire, to 
142 



YOUR LIFE HID IN CHRIST 143 

the Jewish Church, Jesus Christ was dead. He was 
buried by friends, and his body was embalmed by those 
who loved and followed him. To imperial Rome, that 
was the end of Jesus Christ. They said, " His disciples 
stole the body by night." They never saw it again. 
Jesus Christ was dead to imperial Rome and unbelieving 
Judaism. But back of Rome, and back of Judaism was 
the reason for his death. " I delivered unto you first of 
all that which I received, how that Jesus Christ died on 
account of our sins." He did not die on account of 
Rome. He did not die on account of Judaism. He died 
on account of sins. Back of the incandescent lamp is 
the wire. Back of the wire is the current. Back of the 
current is the whirling dynamo. Back of the dynamo is 
the revolving turbine wheel ; and back of it all is the sud- 
den plunge of the waters. Back of the cross, back of 
Jewish hatred, back of Roman cruelty, is sin. Had there 
been no sin in the world, neither Judaism nor Roman 
imperialism would have crucified Jesus Christ. 

The Miracle of Christ's Death 

That Christ should have lived is not remarkable. That, 
having died, he should have risen, is not wonderful; but 
the death of Christ is the miracle. When we remember 
the place he holds in Christian thought, when we re- 
member that by him and through him and for him were 
all things made that were made, that evolution is but the 
expression of his creative will, that the stars are set in 
their places and the planets swing in their orbits by his 
word, that he is the life of the world and the universe, 
it is not wonderful that he should incarnate himself, 
making matter, and molding it in many beautiful forms, 
breathing into it until it becomes life, shaping it until 
it becomes a man. The Son of God has reached his limit 



144 HONEST DEBTORS 

as Creator. The only way now is to incarnate himself in 
human nature. That is the next step. If the leaven is 
to lift the flour, it must incarnate itself in the flour. The 
electric current must incarnate itself in the incandescent 
lamp. If Jesus Christ, the divine Son of God, is to make 
humanity divine, he must become a man. He cannot 
create divinity. That is uncreated. He can create hu- 
manity; he can take upon himself our flesh and our 
blood, and lift us into his likeness ; but he cannot make 
himself one of us by standing outside of us. He must 
enter into our human nature. So one would expect 
logically that sometime the Son of God would incarnate 
himself. And this logical expectation, falling upon the 
shadow of the religious world, has given birth to many 
incarnations. It is not an uncommon thing among the 
heathen to find a belief that their gods must become men. 
One must expect it. When we remember what Christ 
was in the manifestation of his life — how he played with 
the forces of life and death as our children play with 
their nursery toys — one must expect the resurrection. 
His disciples remembered how he said he should come 
again on the third day. The incarnation seems reason- 
able. The resurrection seems rational. But one is stag- 
gered by the fact of death. That a being in whom are 
the fountains of life — the governor of the universe — 
should deliberately lay down his life, seems incredible.. 
You might as well expect the Atlantic to desert its basin 
and become a desert ; you might as well expect the moun- 
tains to leave their places, as for the Son of God — the 
source of all life — to die. There is the stumbling-stone 
in Christian thinking. That he who is the Light of the 
World should have gone down into the valley of the 
shadow of death, that he who is in the bosom of the 
Father should be forsaken of the Father and become 



YOUR LIFE HID IN CHRIST 145 

desolate, that is the burden of Christian thought. Hope 
comes by the cradle of the incarnation. Hope comes by 
the touch of the resurrection, but hope dies by the Cross 
of the crucifixion. Christ died. And yet, there is no fact 
in human history so well attested as that Christ died. 

Dead to Sin 

Having died, he died to sin. He put sin to death in the 
flesh. Sin hath now no more dominion over him. The 
sin question is settled so far as Christ is concerned. But 
what has that to do with you and me ? Much every way. 
The man who accepts Jesus Christ, accepts his death, and 
the man who accepts the death of Jesus Christ, dies with 
him to sin. " Ye died with Christ." 

There is, in a village among the hills, a great manu- 
facturing establishment, and there was there at one time 
a county academy. It was common for the boys of the 
village to get their training there. Among them one 
went to and fro for many months, the ideal of a college 
life before him. When he entered that academy, he en- 
tered into its life ; he came under its laws ; he surrendered 
to its teachers ; he accepted its ideals ; he entered into the 
inheritance of its intellectual life. When the bell sounded 
at nine o'clock, it meant him. When it struck at one, it 
meant him. He was dead to the other schools in the vil- 
lage, dead to the other life of the village during school 
hours, it had no claims over him. He changed his mind, 
left the academy life, and went into the shipping-office of 
the great manufactory. When he crossed its threshold, 
he died to the academy life. It had no more claims over 
him. The bell rung its calls at nine and at one, but it 
meant nothing to him. The teachers laid down laws, 
but not for the regulation of his life. They gave lessons, 
but not to him. He had passed into a new sphere, and 



146 HONEST DEBTORS 

was dead to the past. He died to school life when he 
took upon him the obligations of work. The new bell 
rang at seven, and called him. It rang at twelve, and he 
went out with the others. It rang at one, and he resumed 
work. It rang at six, and the books were closed. His 
ideals and purposes had changed since he had gone to 
work with his hands. Instead of the reward of merit, 
he looked for the monthly wage when due. He lived as 
though he had never known the academy life. Three 
years passed, and he was sent down to the New York 
store. Then the shop was dead to him. The morning 
and noon bell rang, but meant nothing to him. He never 
looked into the office once a month to get his wages. 
There were new rewards and new duties. Another three 
years passed, and he changed his mind again, and re- 
turned to his books. He went to an academy four miles 
from a railroad. Then he died to the store in the great 
city of New York, died to the life of a merchant, and 
lived again the life of a scholar. 

Do you know, that is precisely what it means to go 
to school to Jesus Christ? Die to the world. Let its 
bells ring. Let its rewards be offered. Let its laws be 
passed. Let its demands be issued. The man who ac- 
cepts Jesus Christ dies with him on the cross to the world, 
to sin. Sin no more has dominion over him — but it files 
its claims. 

The other day a lady was out making calls. She 
pushed the electric-button, and the maid came to the door. 

"Is Mrs. B. in?" 

" No." 

" When will she be at home? " 

" After you have left." 

A well-trained maid. Sin comes to your door as a 
Christian. It proposes to make a call. You look into its 



YOUR LIFE HID IN CHRIST 147 

face, and if you are a Christian, you are not at home to 
known sin. When will you be at home ? When sin has 
gone to the next block, has ended its call. Ye died with 
Christ. 

When Woodrow Wilson was President of the United 
States, he could, by virtue of the power vested in him, 
declare war. Let him try it now. Let him issue a procla- 
mation now on account of Germany. The American 
Republic would laugh. We are dead to Woodrow Wil- 
son as President of the United States. He can file his 
claims, but he has no power. Once he was the ruler of 
the Republic at the White House ; today he is one of one 
hundred and ten millions. Once sin ruled over your life. 
Today it has no more dominion over you. Ye died. It 
simply becomes a question of what is right and what is 
wrong. When you settle that question, you have settled 
the question of the power of that temptation over your 
life, if you are a Christian man or woman. There may be 
some difference of opinion as to what is right and what 
is wrong, but there is no difference of judgment when it 
comes to a question of doing right when you know it, 
and wrong when you know it; and, if you live near to 
Christ, the time will soon come when, as in the Book of 
Revelation, the name of the Master was written on the 
forehead of believers, so the name of sin will be en- 
graved on the forehead of temptation, and you will know 
wrong when you see it. 

Alive to Christ 

When Christ died, he died for my sins. When I ac- 
cepted Jesus Christ, I recognized that fact, and stepped 
with him away from sin. Down at the Ellicott Square 
Building I want to find the tenth floor, and step into the 
elevator. From that moment I have resigned my claims 



148 HONEST DEBTORS 

on the floor. I have given myself to the elevator to be 
borne up by its steady power. I cannot be on the floor 
and in the elevator at the same time. The man who has 
stepped off the floor of worldliness and sin into the fin- 
ished redemption of Jesus Christ, must have the steel 
door closed behind him and surrender. You die to the 
floor when you live to the elevator. And you die to sin 
when you live to Jesus Christ. When you look upon the 
dying of the Son of God on the world's altar, you see 
your life thread woven into that great web on the loom of 
the Cross. By one man sin entered the world. By one 
man it goes out of the world. Because one man sinned, 
death passed upon all, for that all sinned. Because of one 
man's death to sin, life passed upon you who will accept 
that life and cease the life of sin. If that first man who 
committed the first sin had refused the temptation, you 
and I would have inherited the strength of that refusal 
in our characters. He yielded, and we inherited the ten- 
dency in character — an inheritance of almost almighty 
power. If he had refused, the blight would never have 
come upon the inheritance, and we would not have in- 
herited what was blighted by sin. 

A man holds a pet dog in his lap for a moment. The 
white teeth close on the quivering flesh, and the germ of 
hydrophobia has lodged in one blood corpuscle. He can 
find neither the corpuscle nor the germ. And that germ 
has a mortgage on every drop of blood in his veins — to be 
foreclosed at the will of the germ. The man, realizing 
this fact, that his whole body is poisoned by that one 
germ, betakes himself to a Pasteur office for treatment. 
He surrenders himself and his blood and the germ of 
hydrophobia to the antitoxin taken into a blood corpuscle ; 
and the whole question of hydrophobia is made over to 
that germ of antitoxin. He has surrendered his life to 



YOUR LIFE HID IN CHRIST 149 

the new life, and the old life is canceled. He returns to 
his business and is accosted by a friend: 

" Were you not bitten by a mad dog? " 

" Yes." 

" Do you not fear hydrophobia? " 

" No." 

" What has canceled your fear ? " 

" Pasteur treatment. I am immune. I am dead to 
hydrophobia. Except for the lacerating of the flesh, I 
might now play fearlessly with any mad dog you might 
bring." 

The germ of sin comes from a human ancestor away 
back somewhere who sinned. There is no one who has 
borne and reared children but remembers when he saw 
the poison begin to work in the face of his innocent child. 
What is the cure? Die to sin. How? By living to 
Jesus Christ. Ye died to sin. Your life is hid with 
Christ in God. 

Hid with Christ in God 

The source of life is always hidden. The springs of 
being are always in the dark. The source of Niagara 
River is in Lake Erie, right by our door. The source 
of Erie is another lake, and beyond that another, and yet 
another. Who ever saw the springs of Lake Superior? 
They are hidden in the great mountains and plains of the 
mighty Northwest. No man has ever seen them. The 
spring is always hidden. The source is always covered. 
Your life is hid with Christ in God. For when Christ 
died to sin, he lived to God ; and they who die to sin and 
live with Christ, live with Christ where Christ is, at the 
right hand of God. 

It is the day of Atonement. The city is thronged with 
visitors from the ends of the earth. The Jews are gath- 



150 HONEST DEBTORS 

ered around the great temple courts by the thousand. 
Before them stands the high priest in full uniform sacri- 
ficing the animal. Taking the blood in the basin, he 
enters into the Holy Place to make atonement for the 
sins of the people and the life of the nation. And that 
bowl of blood hidden in the Holy Place — every heart 
beats toward it, every prayer seeks entrance into it, every 
thought is drawn to it ; and the conscience and the life of 
the nation are in the keeping of that high priest until he 
comes again and says, " Jehovah has again forgiven your 
sins." With a sigh of relief the tide ebbs out into the 
waiting channels to its homes in the mountains and by 
the sea. Jesus Christ, the High Priest of our profession, 
in the holy place of the great universe temple, hath of- 
fered his own blood once for all, and ever liveth to make 
intercession for us; and our lives, as worshipers of the 
living God through the living Christ, are hid with Christ 
in God. 

If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father. 
A man has committed a great crime and is being tried for 
his life. He has called to his side a lawyer, and into that 
lawyer has poured his story, telling him all the facts of 
the case. They are in the court-room together. The 
criminal is mute. The lawyer is his lips. The lawyer is 
his brains. The lawyer is his hope. His life is hid with 
the lawyer in the court. If the lawyer breaks down and 
fails, the man will be hung; if he succeeds, the man will 
be acquitted. His life is hid with the lawyer. If any 
man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus 
Christ, the righteous. With mute lips silenced by sin, 
with burdened heart crushed by sin, with wasted life deso- 
lated by sin, I wait before the high court of the eternal 
tribunal, while Jesus Christ makes my plea. My life is 
hid with Christ before God. I died to sin when I lived 



YOUR LIFE HID IN CHRIST 151 

to Christ. I made over all my assets and liabilities, my 
hopes and fears. 

A woman lies in the agony of her sickness. The doc- 
tor is summoned and passes through the room as silent 
as a shadow. The husband waits in the room without. 
His life is hid with that doctor in the sick-room. He can 
do nothing. His presence would only prejudice against 
the disease and death. He must wait in the outer room, 
while the doctor, on bended knee, reaches far down into 
the valley of shadows groping for the life that seems to 
be slipping from him ; and the man on his face, pleading 
and praying and weeping — his life is hid with the doctor 
by what may be the dying bed of his wife. Jesus Christ 
is for me the Great Physician. My life is hid with him 
in God. 

But this Christ, who is with God, shall be manifested; 
and when he is manifested, we shall be glorified with him. 
Christ's incarnation was not manifestation; it was hu- 
miliation. He emptied himself first. He must needs do 
that to come as a man. No man manifests himself, but 
he empties himself first. His incarnation was humiliation 
for the purpose of bearing away the sin of the world. 
His manifestation shall be a revelation. He came as a 
prophet, and for three years the words he spoke were 
words he had heard from God. The works he wrought 
were things he had seen his Father do. He died and 
ascended on high, leading captivity captive. Now the 
high priest does not manifest himself while he is by the 
altar making his plea. He is coming as our King. He 
was a prophet. That is humiliation. He is a priest. 
That is petition. He is coming as King. That will be 
manifestation. 

The world has its face toward Westminster Cathe- 
dral. The great British Empire is about to set the crown 



152 HONEST DEBTORS 

upon a new king's head, and the great cathedral will be 
crowded with the royalty of the world. Great Britain 
will do her best to impress the world with her grandeur 
and dignity and might. In a few weeks her leading arch- 
bishop will place the crown of the mightiest empire in 
the world upon the head of the new king, and the great 
civilization will exhaust itself trying to impress the world 
with its power. It will be a manifestation of the glory of 
Great Britain. Russia strained every nerve to manifest 
her power when crowning the czar. Germany exerted 
herself to the utmost to reveal her power when the Kaiser 
was crowned. How the mighty empire that girdles the 
earth will straighten herself to manifest her power on 
sea and land when she crowns her king. What think you 
it will be when our King comes, when the accumulated 
prayers of the centuries will be answered and the mighty 
prophecies of the past will be fulfilled; when, as the 
lightning flashes, every eye will see him, and they that 
are in the grave will leap to the resurrection body, and 
the new heaven and new earth will appear, and Jesus 
Christ will manifest his glory. 

On the Mount of Transfiguration he lifted the mask 
a little, and men, catching a glimpse, fell prostrate — 
dazzled. On the road to Damascus he leaned forward a 
little, and smiled upon the mistaken Jew, and the smile 
blinded him for three days and three nights. What, 
think you, must the overwhelming glory be when the 
Son of God, who made the worlds, will manifest him- 
self as the King of a kingdom that will have no end, 
wherein will be no sorrow nor sighing nor death nor 
sin? He will manifest himself, and when he does, his 
saints will be manifested with him. The lost will look 
upon the glory from the outside. The saints will look 
out of the glory from the inside. 



YOUR LIFE HID IN CHRIST 153 

Ye died with Christ — died to sin. Let sin, then, no more 
have dominion over you. Your lives are hid with Christ 
in God. When Christ, who is our glory, shall appear — 
shall be manifested — we shall be manifested with him. 
Till then, set your mind on things that are above, and be 
true to your death, and true to your life. 



XVI 

THE LIFE OF FAITH 

"For what saith the Scripture? Abraham believed God, and 
it was counted unto him for righteousness." — Romans 4 : 3. 

Abraham holds a large place in three creeds, the Jew, 
the Mohammedan, and the Christian, all claiming him as 
their father. A man is known by what he identifies him- 
self with. A man by himself amounts to very little. 
There was no motto ever coined so infamous as " Safety 
first." The Christian saved through faith throws him- 
self like a thunderbolt into the struggle for righteousness 
by faith. Salvation by faith comes through Abraham, 
the father of the faithful. He identified himself with 
God. A brick is worth very little by itself ; it is easily 
crumbled. But surrendered to the architect's plan, it be- 
comes a part of the building. A single thread wound on 
a bobbin amounts to very little, but surrendered to the 
loom it becomes part of the great web. It becomes part 
of the protection for men against the strong wind and 
the rigors of the New England winter. We have value 
only as we surrender ourselves to a great principle, a 
mighty cause by which forces in us are set free, and so 
we become partakers of the divine nature. We become 
sharers in the kingdom of righteousness through faith 
and the finished work of Jesus Christ. His church is 
charged over to us because we accept him by faith. Men 
lived by faith before Abraham's day. Enoch walked with 
God, but he was a lonely man. When he sank out of 
sight over the horizon he left no tracks behind in the 
154 



THE LIFE OF FAITH 155 

highway of faith. Noah had a family, and he built an 
ark for the safety of his family. It is better to live with 
your family than to live alone. In all the struggles in the 
eleventh of Hebrews you will find that the men were per- 
sonal believers. 

Abraham was the founder of the faith; he was the 
father of such as live by faith ; so let us study him a little 
to find what it means to live a faithful life. 

A Life of Separation 

First of all, it means separation. The word of Jeho- 
vah came to Abraham and said : " Get thee out of thy 
country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's 
house, unto a land that I will shew thee." Abraham was 
a great man, but he was not great enough to span the 
Euphrates. He was not a hyphenated believer in Jeho^ 
vah. He did not live for two worlds. There was a time 
when men could say they were German-Americans and 
British-Americans, and so on through the list, but that 
time has passed. They are all Americans or they have 
no welcome beneath the Stars and Stripes. We want no 
hyphenated citizens, and we want no hyphenated Chris- 
tians. Faith means separation, and that is why so many 
men shrink from the life of faith. They are not willing 
to be separated. When the time came for Isaac to marry, 
Abraham did not wait for the young man to take the 
initiative, as we do today; he called his servant and sent 
him up into his own country, told him to go to his fath- 
er's house and to his kindred, and find a wife for Isaac 
out of the daughters of his own land. He made a test, 
and found the woman. He went with dress-goods and 
jewels, and spread out his goods before her, and when 
she saw them and heard about Isaac and Abraham and 
the future that remained for her, she said, " I will go." 



156 HONEST DEBTORS 

She knew she must go from her own country ; she could 
not live in both lands, she could not bring Isaac back; 
she must divorce herself absolutely from all her former 
life and leave her family. No woman is fit to be a wife 
who loves her father better than her husband. No father 
and daughter were ever one flesh yet; no mother and 
daughter were ever one flesh yet. No man is fit to be a 
hunsband who does not love his wife better than his 
mother. " For this cause shall a man leave his father 
and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife. ,, This is 
true of the Christian service. The church is the bride of 
Christ. If you are not willing to leave the old life, with 
its charms and its prosperity, you cannot live the life of 
Christ, you cannot be the bride of Jesus Christ, for love 
is jealous. Faith means separation absolutely. There 
are men here this morning who have not accepted Jesus 
Christ. I tell you frankly and fairly that until you are 
ready to leave the world, its motives, its activities, and its 
life, you never can be a Christian. A man cannot be a 
citizen and a soldier at the same time. He cannot be in 
the army of Jesus Christ and a citizen of the world at the 
same time. There must be an absolute surrender of the 
world. That means that Christ will come into your life ; 
his motive becomes your motive. When grafting we set 
the graft into the tree, and the sap of the graft produces 
the fruit. It has the power of transforming. But when 
we are grafted into Christ, his sap settles our fruit. He 
has the power to change the sap of our life, the motive 
of it. Unless you are willing for that change, do not 
run the risk of being grafted, for you will only be cut 
off and withered. 

Faith means first of all separation, change of motive, 
a surrender of will. 

Our highways in city and country are constantly break- 



THE LIFE OF FAITH 157 

ing down. They have to be repaired. During the season 
of repairing we hang out red lanterns as a warning. 
There was a time when Abraham's faith broke down. 
There was a red lantern hung out. Let us study the 
reasons for it. Jehovah called him out of the land of 
Canaan. Famine drove him down, into Egypt. He 
went down for the food question. There was a famine 
in Canaan, and so that he might get three square meals 
a day he went down into Egypt. 

You remember the little girl who, on the night before 
the family went to Saratoga, said, " God, good-bye, to- 
morrow we are going to Saratoga." Abraham seems to 
have left his faith in Canaan when he went down to 
Egypt, and after a while he settled down into Egyptian 
civilization. Sarah was a princess. That is what the 
word means. Hardly had she crossed the border, when 
Abraham said to her, " Tell Pharaoh that you are my 
sister, and he will spare my life. ,, That is about as near 
the white slave traffic as you will get in the Old Testa- 
ment — a man saved and supported by his wife in the 
stranger's palace. And so Pharaoh enriched Abraham 
and took Sarah. But the plague struck Pharaoh's house 
because of her. He sent word out to know what was the 
trouble. Abraham, the man of faith, lied. It is a sad 
time for the Christian church when the ethics of the 
world are higher than those of the church. Is it a sure 
sign to trust a business man because he belongs to the 
church, and his word is as good as a bond? A pastor 
in a neighboring church told me of an experience that 
he had some years ago. He had a member of the church 
who was an agent for a manufacturer of woolen goods. 
This pastor went to a tailor on School Street to buy a 
pair of trousers. The man was a deacon in a Congrega- 
tional Church in the heart of the city. He showed him 



158 HONEST DEBTORS 

his goods and said : " Now here are American goods 
[during the Civil War when everything was high], that 
pair of trousers would cost you seven dollars. But now 
here is another piece of broadcloth which is imported and 
will cost you fourteen dollars, but they are worth it. 
They will outwear the others three to one." So the 
pastor bought it. One day he wore them to a dinner with 
the member of the church. While at dinner the son of 
the manufacturer turned to the pastor and said, " I see 
you have got some of our goods on." " Oh, no," he re- 
plied. " Why, yes." " No, I bought them of so and so 
on School Street. These were imported; he showed me 
the labels and the string and paper." " That is all right ; 
we import the labels and the string and the paper, but 
we make the goods." He was an active member of the 
Christian church too. Woe betide the day when you can- 
not take a man's word because he is a Christian. 

In the State of Georgia there is a Baptist church. Any 
man who mentioned the fact that he was a member of 
that church could get unlimited credit, if such a one, 
being a member of the church, went into a wholesale store 
and said, " My church is so and so." They discipline 
men in that church who do not keep their word. It is 
a sad day for the Christian church when the men who 
reject Christ can be trusted better than the men who pro- 
fess to be saved by faith in Jesus Christ. 

What is salvation? When Jesus Christ, the way and 
the truth and the life, saves a soul from the death of sin, 
he wakens it into a vital expression of his own love. 
Christ formed you in the hope of being worthy of the 
highest, he formed you also in integrity and righteous- 
ness. 

So Pharaoh, the heathen, turned Abraham, the father 
of the faithful, out of Egypt with a lie on his lips. When 



THE LIFE OF FAITH 159 

he went back he carried with him, or his wife carried 
with her, Hagar, an Egyptian slave girl given to Sarah 
by Pharaoh. Now Abraham had fooled with Sarah's 
faith, and her faith broke down. She knew the promise 
of Abraham that he should have a son, but he had fooled 
her once. Oh, you men wonder that your wife's faith 
breaks down when you tamper with it and fool with it 
and lie to her! So she said to Abraham, with her 
broken faith : " The time is past for me ; take you Hagar, 
and we will have a son." So he took Hagar, and a boy 
was born. It brought bitterness into the camp, for the 
slave girl taunted her mistress, and she went to Abraham 
with the story of her bitterness. And he said, " She is 
your property, do what you will with her." And she 
banished her to the desert. She went out, and Jehovah 
met her, and Ishmael became the head of a tribe — and 
Hagar, the Egyptian girl, was the ancestress of the Mo- 
hammedan world. The fighting against the Cross that has 
deluged the Eastern world with blood is due to that trip 
of Abraham when he went down to Egypt on the food 
question and brought back Hagar, the Egyptian slave 
girl. " Great oaks from little acorns grow." 

Oh, men, you can never tell what is bound up in a lie, 
in a transgression of righteousness — what is bound up in 
a life of faith. Great national movements spring from 
such sins. They went back to Canaan and the years 
went by. 

A Life of Service 

Faith means separation ; faith means service. Lot went 
with Abraham. He was his brother's son. The young 
man had no religious life; he lived under the shelter of 
his uncle. He is what we call a " trailer." You have 
seen trolley-cars that have no touch with the wire but 



160 HONEST DEBTORS 

trail along. Well, Lot was a trailer. He was a hitcher- 
on to Abraham. He had no spiritual life, no faith at all. 
Word came to Abraham, and he said to Lot : " Come 
out on the hilltop, my young man, look east, west, 
north, and south. Take your choice, and I will take 
what is left." Oh, men ! It takes some faith in God to 
give the other man the first choice. How many of you 
have? In the competition that has grown up in the 
shadow of the cross, it is every man for himself, taking 
advantage of a man's weakness, taking advantage of a 
man's ignorance. 

But faith means service. It means giving the other 
fellow a more than equal chance, for he is handicapped 
by his weakness where you are strong. And so Lot 
chose the market-place and pitched his tent toward 
Sodom. He had a fine market for his wool and his mut- 
ton. But prosperity begets covetousness. Kings formed 
an alliance, something like the alliance in Central Europe 
today between the Turks and the Germans. So they 
came down upon the plains, and they seized Lot's goods 
and his treasure, and he went into bankruptcy and cap- 
tivity. Abraham at once organized an alliance and went 
down to the defense of the weak, for faith in God means 
the defense of the weak. He had no other interest in 
saving Lot except his faith in God. They fell upon the 
alliance, defeated them and brought Lot back again and 
set him up in business. Lot took pattern by the motto 
" Safety first " and went inside the city. It was safer. 
He had city walls around him now, and he settled down 
into civilization as far as he could. Of course it jarred 
him, but it meant safety, and his two daughters married 
men of Sodom, and Lot sat at the gate. 

The cities of Sodom and Gomorrah became offensive, 
and Jehovah sent three messengers down to see about 



THE LIFE OF FAITH 161 

the facts. They waited on Abraham, and Abraham en- 
tertained them, and then they went to the hilltop and 
told him what was coming to Sodom. Hour after hour 
the great man prayed : " Oh, God, save Sodom for fifty 
righteous men. Yes — for forty; yes — for thirty; yes — 
for twenty ; yes — ten " ; and Abraham was ashamed to 
beat Jehovah down any more. And so the angels went 
down to Sodom, and Lot invited them into his home. 
The angels of the Almighty took Lot, his wife, and 
daughters and started for the hills to safety. He went 
and reasoned with the sons-in-law, and he was as a man 
who mocked to his sons-in-law. God pity the man whose 
Christianity is a mockery to the men who marry into his 
family. 

A Life of Sacrifice 

Abraham left his own country, and his faith grew and 
grew, and Isaac was born. Who can tell the joy in the 
old man's heart, the pride in the mother's breast as they 
looked down into the smiling face of the boy. Years 
passed. The nerve-center of the world's movement was 
cradled in the arms of Sarah under the smile of Abra- 
ham. The babe became a boy, then a youth. There is 
such a thing as forgetting the giver in the gift; trans- 
ferring the emphasis from the promiser to the promise. 
Then came the test of faith, the supreme test of sacri- 
fice. Faith means separation, faith means service, faith 
means sacrifice. God called. Abraham said, " Here am 
I." " Abraham, take thy son, thine only son Isaac. Go 
to Mount Moriah and sacrifice him." Abraham took 
Isaac. They bound a bundle of fagots to the ass's back, 
when they reached the mountain, tethered him to a bush, 
and climbed the hilltop. And the young man said to his 
father, " Here is the fire and the wood, but where is the 



162 HONEST DEBTORS 

sacrifice ? " Remember in that country at that time the 
child had no rights. He was simply a part of the life of 
the father. He had no independent existence until the 
father died. Abraham had a perfect right to take his 
boy's life. " God will provide a sacrifice." They toiled 
their way up the steep hill, built the altar, spread out the 
fagots, and Abraham bound the boy. The great-hearted 
father lifted his eyes toward heaven and looked down on 
the defenseless boy. He believed that God was able to 
raise him from the dead. A moment, and a keen blade 
flashed in the Eastern sun. The voice of Jehovah broke 
the stillness. Looking into the bush the man saw a sub- 
stitute. The knife fell, the cords were cut, the boy was 
free. A substitute was offered. Jehovah had conquered. 
Abraham cared more for God than he did for Isaac. 
Nothing can come between the soul and the Lord, neither 
property, success, social standing, wife, or children. We 
learn that God is a jealous God. Love is very jealous. 
It declares no dividends on the object of love. Faith then 
means separation; faith means keeping out of Egypt. 
Faith means service to a weak humanity, unreserved 
sacrifice to God. Have we faith? 






XVII 

AUTHORITY IN RELIGION 

"And when they had set them in the midst, they asked, By 
what power, or by what name, have ye done this? Then Peter, 
filled with the Holy Ghost, said unto them, Ye rulers of the 
people and elders of Israel, if we this day be examined of the 
good deed done to the impotent man, by what means he is made 
whole; Be it known unto you all, and to all the people of Israel, 
that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye cruci- 
fied, whom God raised from the dead, even by him doth this man 
stand here before you whole." — Acts 4 : 7-10. 

A noted miracle had been wrought by the Beautiful Gate 
— a man born lame, who had lived through a life of more 
than forty years, who had lain for years daily by the 
Beautiful Gate asking alms of them who went into the 
temple, was suddenly healed. For years, men seeking 
God had found that, as a stepping-stone to the divine 
altar, they must give their offerings to this crippled 
brother ; so their riches were spent in usefulness. But in 
a moment, a man without money, in the name of Jesus 
Christ, had done more than all Judaism had done, all 
that money could do. 

This miracle had of course created great excitement, 
and the people gathered by thousands about Peter. He 
used the opportunity to preach Jesus, the resurrection, 
and the life. More marvelous than to change the crooked 
body was the power to change the minds of five thousand 
men. This miracle attracted the attention of the leaders 
of the nation ; and the captain of the temple and the Sad- 
ducees seized Peter and threw him into prison. And the 

163 



164 HONEST DEBTORS 

next morning the first question was for the secret of 
authority and power. It is a religious question. This 
was a religious miracle, wrought at the gate of the tem- 
ple, by a follower of the Messiah. All questions at bot- 
tom are religious questions. When a man is rightly re- 
lated toward God, you can trust him with his fellows. 
All questions of sociology, political economy, and ethics 
of the home and business life, are correlated with re- 
ligious questions. The secret of power is in right rela- 
tion with God. 

And so these men, looking into Peter's face, said, " By 
what authority, or by what power, or in what name have 
you done this ? " Centuries before, when Moses was 
watching his father-in-law's flocks in the backside of the 
desert, an angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame 
of fire in a bush, and the bush was not consumed. After- 
ward Moses sought God, saying : " When I come to the 
children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of 
your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say 
to me, What is his name ? what shall I say unto them ? " 
And God said, " Thou shalt say, I AM hath sent me unto 
you." Moses reasonably anticipated his people's inquiry 
into the authority back of his word. 

When Jesus was teaching in the temple, the priests and 
elders came to him and said : " By what authority do you 
do these things ? Who gave you this authority ? " We 
are always pushing our way back to find the authority, 
the secret of power. And so, in the religious life, we 
want to know the source and seat of authority, the reason 
why we are Christians. 

Reason and Authority 

A certain class of men say that the seat of authority in 
the religions life is in the reason. The ultimate court, 



AUTHORITY IN RELIGION 165 

the supreme bench beyond which there is no appeal, is 
the reason of man. If a thing seems reasonable, do it. 
If it seems unreasonable, let it alone. If a proposition 
appears to you to be reasonable, accept it ; if it does not, 
reject it. Well now, the trouble with that is that the 
human reason is an effect and not a cause, and the stand- 
ard for the ruling of an effect is not in the effect itself, 
but in the cause. The standard of authority must be 
found in the creation of the reason, and not in the reason 
itself. 

It will not do for each man to have his own standard 
of time. When two men are making a business appoint- 
ment in the afternoon, they compare watches and see how 
nearly they agree, for it is rarely that you will find two 
watches that agree. At twelve o'clock every day there 
is a ringing of bells and a blowing of whistles in Buffalo, 
and people look at their watches to consult the standard. 
The standard of time for the Republic of America is in 
Washington. 

The standard of authority is not in the keeping of 
man; it is in the keeping of God. It will not do for a 
man to fall back upon his own reason and regulate his 
life by that, simply because man is not all reason. He is 
made up of many conflicting passions and powers, and 
when the passions have the sweep over the sea of life, 
the reason is not to be trusted. 

One day, going down into the heart of a Fall River 
boat to study the dynamic source of electric light, I was 
told to leave my watch outside, because there were 
powers there that would make it useless as a watch. It 
is reason that is the dynamic seat of man's power, but it 
is reason impressed by passions; it is reason blinded by 
prejudice ; and unaided human reason is not a safe guide. 
What seems reasonable to me today may seem unreason- 



166 HONEST DEBTORS 

able tomorrow. What seems reasonable to me from my 
point of view, is unreasonable to my nearest neighbor 
upon my right or my left. 

The Hebrew story of the creation shows us the man 
walking with God in the cool of the day, and how, there 
in the morning light, he saw the tree of knowledge of 
good and evil. He did not know either good or evil him- 
self ; he depended upon a standard outside himself. He 
wanted to become like the gods, and so he plucked and 
ate the fruit of the tree, and knew good and evil. Now 
the man who knows both good and evil is not a safe guide 
when he depends upon his reason. 

The Greek wrought out the same thought in another 
way. Plato teaches a marvelous myth, and back of the 
myth lies a wonderful thought. He says all immaterial 
nature is under subjection to soul, and soul comes out in 
the form of gods and man. Once in ten thousand years 
the Father of gods and men leads all souls up through 
the heavens. Soul he likens to a charioteer with two 
horses. The gods have two horses that match; human 
souls have mismatched horses. Once in ten thousand 
years the gods make their way up and pass to the out- 
side regions of pure reason, pure knowledge, and pure 
science, and when the gods have filled themselves with 
these things, they come back and try to work them into 
human governments and institutions. But human souls 
can never reach the sublime height that the gods attain; 
so these souls come tumbling back to earth. The human 
soul brings its broken vision and controls its life in the 
fragments of its broken vision. And so the human soul 
must commune with the gods, and the gods must com- 
mune with pure knowledge and righteousness and justice. 
Plato, the reasoner, did not depend upon his own unaided 
reason. 



AUTHORITY IN RELIGION 167 

The Bible and Authority 

It will not do to depend upon one's reason as the seat 
of authority. One must go back to some accepted stand- 
ard. The standard of reason changes through the cen- 
turies. It shifts as men get more light. And so men turn 
to a book they call the Bible, and they say the standard 
of authority is the Bible. It is a wonderful book; it is 
made of sixty-six little pamphlets ; in it is found the mar- 
velous experience of scores of men who have had dealings 
with God; it is a revelation of God's methods of work- 
ing with men; but it never claims to be a standard of 
authority. It is a veil through which we catch the fea- 
tures of the divine face, but the authority is in the face, 
not in the veil. It will not do to count the spots of the 
veil and think you have seen the face. The man who 
rests upon the Bible as authority, and does not find the 
God who reveals himself through it, has found, not a 
faith that he can hold, but a debatable field that he must 
always contest. 

Peter had the Old Testament. He knew it as no man 
living knows it today. As a Jew, he had been taught its 
letter, and as a Christian, he had been taught its spirit. 
For three years he had walked with the old prophets, who 
had revealed its teachings to him. For ten days he had 
waited in prayer, and then received the gift of the Holy 
Ghost. He knew that book as you and I do not know it. 
The New Testament was not written in that day. And 
yet Peter did not say, " In the name of the book is the 
source of power, is the standard of authority, ,, but in the 
name of Jesus Christ. The book, like revelations of God 
through nature, is always unfolding itself more and more 
to us. We know more of the Bible today than our 
fathers did. It is not to be taken as the standard of 



168 HONEST DEBTORS 

authority; it is the revelation of a living God, but that 
which is revealed is the standard, not the revelation itself. 
It is a record of marvelous treatment that God gave to 
man. 

Doctor Chivers, for many years pastor here in Buffalo, 
told me this story that he knew was true — he had seen 
the record of it in a Welsh village. A Welshman had 
been sick with rheumatism for months, and finally some 
one suggested that if he would lay a Welsh Bible beside 
him in bed, it would heal him. So they hunted the village 
over and could not find one, for the village was a poor 
one. There was, however, one English Bible, and they 
borrowed it and put it in bed with him. The town 
records state that " the man was helped, but that he would 
have been helped more had the Bible been in the original 
Welsh. ,, 

The standard of authority is not in the language, it is 
not in the text, it is not in the wording ; it is in the power 
of Christ's life. 

The Church and Authority 

There be others that tell us that the source and seat of 
authority is the church, and, by the church, men who talk 
like that mean the Roman Catholic Church. Now, of 
what is the church made up? Of men of like passions 
with ourselves. If a single human reason is not worthy 
of confidence that it may become a standard, neither will 
a thousand human reasons bunched together become a 
standard of authority. A million of imperfect bricks will 
make an imperfect building. The church of Jesus Christ 
is made up of imperfect men and women, and an organiza- 
tion made up of aggregate imperfection can never assume 
the ideals of perfection. Whatever authority there may 
be in the church is delegated power. The church at its 



AUTHORITY IN RELIGION 169 

best is but a channel through which healing influences 
flow. Because God sees fit to work through this, the seat 
of authority is not the sacrament, but God who is divine. 

Watch the magazines and you will find a very interest- 
ing discussion during the next few months. Sir George 
Mivart, a devout Catholic, has reached the point where 
he cannot accept the church on scientific questions. All 
the teaching of the church is against his observation of 
science, and so he appeals to his fathers in the faith, and 
they have written him a form of creed that he is to sign 
if he remains in the church. The church has decided 
what is scientific truth, and he must accept it in the face 
of all his knowledge. He must throw his knowledge all 
aside and accept the teaching of men who know abso- 
lutely nothing about science. Fortunately for him and 
for you and me, the church is not the standard of au- 
thority. It settles nothing to appeal to a council; for 
such decision is rendered by men of like passions with 
ourselves, and they use reasons that are imperfect, and 
an imperfect reason can never become a standard of 
authority. 

Others tell us that the standard is in the creed. Thirty- 
five pastors have written a beautiful creed, but the men 
who have written it and signed it, all believed it before 
they wrote it and signed it ; it is simply an explanation of 
truth that they have accepted and not a standard of truth 
for others to accept. 

The Authority of Christ 

What then is the standard of truth ? What is the seat 
of authority in religion ? What is the source of the power 
if it is not in the Bible? Listen to Peter: " If I be called 
in question this day for the good deed done to the impo- 
tent man, be it known that I have done it in the name of 

M 



170 HONEST DEBTORS 

Jesus Christ of Nazareth." Jesus of Nazareth, then, is 
the source and secret of pozver. Now we have a scien- 
tific test : Christ was a historic character. Eighteen hun- 
dred years ago he rose above the horizon of human his- 
tory; he lived in Palestine humbly; he died his tragic 
death; he arose again from the dead, and the third day 
ascended on high. And around him gathered a group of 
men and women, and out of that group came apostles and 
truths. For eighteen hundred years men have been seek- 
ing for the truth of Christ; and those who have learned 
the mastery of that name and have bowed to that will, 
have been made whole and righteous and clean and pure. 
Millions of men have leaned on the authority of the 
church and have gone crippled to their graves; millions 
have signed creeds and have done no better ; millions have 
leaned on their reason and have struggled wearily to their 
graves. But over against the standard of church and of 
creed and of reason stands Jesus Christ, and wherever 
men have accepted him there has always come out a pecu- 
liar type of character, and the crippled man has danced 
and sung and laughed by the altars of the unseen God. 
There is the proof of authority — that when he is accepted, 
he brings things to pass. 

Yesterday afternoon I had the pleasure of visiting Fitz- 
hugh Hall in Rochester. Walking around slowly from 
picture to picture of the Tissot collection and studying it, 
reading the introduction to the pamphlet or guide, I 
found that the artist was fifty years of age before he 
accepted Christ. He says : " Every work has its ideal. 
My work has its ideal, the truth of the life and the death 
of Christ, and it is my purpose so to master that life that 
I can make it live again." How did he do it? He bent 
above the Gospels and studied them through a hundred 
times or more. As you lay the white paper against the 



AUTHORITY IN RELIGION 171 

type in the printer's office, and press it until the impress 
of the black type comes back on the white face of the 
paper, so this great artist laid his soul down on the gospel 
one hundred times, and when he lifted it, his imagination 
was filled with Jesus Christ. And then he gave ten years 
of his life when he was fifty years of age to studying 
the home of Christ, until by-and-by his ideal worked itself 
out, and one stands amazed to see how he wrought in 
living colors the life of Jesus Christ, starting with the 
tiny form in the manger, and passing through his entire 
life — his tragic death, the awful suffering of the cruci- 
fixion — until he had wrought out in color Jesus Christ. 
That is what I want to have you do in your life : take the 
Gospels and press your souls down upon them, until the 
chambers of imagery are filled with Jesus Christ; and 
then in the living colors of the daily life, in the thoughts 
you think, in the words you speak, in the deeds you do, 
you will reproduce Christ, and you will find then where 
the standard of authority is in the Christian life. You 
cannot get it by pressing your soul against organization, 
back upon your own reason, pressing the memory against 
creedal forms. It is only as the light in you meets the 
light in Christ, and you surrender absolutely to him, as 
the artist surrendered to his Master, that you will come 
to know the meaning of authority in religion. 



XVIII 

MY SHEPHERD 

" The Lord is my Shepherd."— Psalm 23 : 1. 

Literature expresses life. The customs and habits of 
a people determine the form, the ruling principles, the 
soul. 

The parables of Jesus reflect the customs of Palestine ; 
the soul of the parables reveals the mind of the Master. 

The Parable of the Sheep 

Israel was a shepherd people. Father Abraham was a 
shepherd. His wealth was in flocks and herds. Isaac 
digged again the wells of Abraham. When Jacob left 
home his capital was the trade and tools of a shepherd. 
He served Laban twenty years and left him leading large 
flocks. 

Joseph introduced his brethren as shepherds. Isaiah, 
the prophet, sees Jehovah leading the stars as a flock, 
and calling them all by name. 

David, the Shepherd King, calls Jehovah his Shep- 
herd. Jesus pours the molten metal of his thought into 
the mold of Jewish thought : " I am the good shepherd." 
The church is the flock, Christ is the Shepherd. 

There is no hint of the dignity and divinity of human 
nature in the likeness of man to a sheep. "All we like 
sheep have gone astray." Few think, many follow. 
Many years ago at Kingston, Canada, a flock of sheep 
passed through the town. The leader, seeing his reflec- 
172 



MY SHEPHERD 173 

tion in a shop window, jumped clean through the plate 
glass. The flock of twenty followed. A few think, many 
follow. 

Years ago the Empress of the French wore crinoline. 
The feminine gender followed. Now Dame Fashion de- 
crees short skirts and bare backs. The tide of cloth 
rises to the knees and ebbs to the waist-line. Boys wobble 
on stilts, women on French heels. 

Jehovah did not take all the folly out of man when he 
removed one rib. Man marches to the music of fashion 
as willingly as do women. Clothes, hair-cut, manners 
are determined for us. " All we like sheep." 

A sheep is of a very low order of intelligence. " The 
eye is the window of the soul." A sheep's eye looks like 
a glass eye. You cannot see into it ; he can see very little 
through it. His horizon is between his feet. He has no 
outlook, no uplook. He cannot, like the dog, follow his 
master by scent; he cannot distinguish him by sight. 
" My sheep know my voice." Ear-gate is the only way 
into a sheep's mind. When lost he cannot find his way 
home. If you wish to insult a man you call him a 
" mutton head." If you wish to boast of a bargain you 
say, " I pulled the wool over his eyes." If you wish to 
tell how ashamed you are of a mean trick you say, " I 
feel sheepish." 

The Good Shepherd 

" I shall not want." Not because of my own wisdom 
or strength, but because " The Lord is my Shepherd." 
He guides and guards. I may wish for many things, but 
I shall not want. 

" He maketh me to lie down in green pastures." 
Asleep on the dinner-table. The last sight before sleep, 
food; the first sight when waking, food. Some years 



174 HONEST DEBTORS 

ago in England, passing a beautiful lawn, I saw several 
sheep in cages. When the grass was eaten the cages 
were moved. The sheep had no sense of limitation until 
the food failed. He was an animated lawn-mower, a 
machine for changing grass into mutton and wool, with 
no friction so long as the raw material was on hand. A 
picture of perfect contentment. 

" He leadeth me beside the still waters." Still waters 
with us are a wayside pool; hurrying waters resting by 
the way, mirroring tree and sky. Still waters in Pales- 
tine are in the bottom of a cistern or well. Isaac redug 
wells, Jacob dug a well. Moses and Jacob both watered 
sheep with water from wells. 

" The wells of salvation " are not digged by man. The 
water of life does not spring from the mountain ranges 
of human nature. The water of life is given to, not 
drawn from, the soul of man. The water springing up 
unto life eternal was not found by Jesus in man, but 
given to him. " Living water " is a gift not a develop- 
ment. 

" He restoreth my soul," or life. Here and there, in 
Palestine, there were gardens. A sheep wandering into 
one and caught by the owner of the garden, was killed. 
The shepherd, following the sheep, rescued him and saved 
his life. When we stray into forbidden places and are 
in danger of death, Christ follows and saves. 

" He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his 
name's sake." A path of righteousness is a path that 
ends aright. We cannot see the end from the beginning. 
We cannot see afar off. " There is a way that seemeth 
right unto a man, but the end thereof is death." A path 
may end in a pasture or a pit. " He knows the end from 
the beginning." He gives green pastures, still waters, 
and restored life that he may lead in right paths. He 



MY SHEPHERD 175 

leads, we drive our sheep. He leads " for his name's 
sake," not for our sake. The doctor heals for the honor 
of his profession. The patient is a " case." The profes- 
sion bids him save. The lawyer is urged to do his best 
for the sake of his profession. The clients come and go, 
the profession abides. The patriot gives money, time, 
life itself, for his country's sake. The profiteer works 
for himself, the patriot for his country. The shepherd's 
honor is at stake in his care of the sheep. The wisest 
leading profits nothing unless the sheep follow. 

" It is given unto man once to die." " All paths lead 
but to the grave." Alone you enter the path of life 
through the gate of birth. Alone you must pass out 
through the door of death. Between the gate and the 
door we walk in groups. We enter and leave as 
individuals. 

Thus hand in hand through life we go; 
Its checkered paths of joy and woe 
Together we will tread. 

But we part company at the grave. 

We approach the World's Fair in groups, we enter the 
whirligig gate and are registered one by one, then we 
unite again. 

The Master said, " I am alone, yet not alone, for the 
Father is with me." In death you will be alone, yet not 
alone, for the Shepherd shall be with you. 

When death's cold sullen stream 
Shall o'er me roll. 

But it is neither cold nor sullen. I have waded into it 
to my loins. It is warm and welcoming. Its surface 
mirrors the face and form of the great Companion. 
Notice — up to the valley the shepherd is in the third 



176 HONEST DEBTORS 

person. He leads, he feeds, he saves, but in the valley 
he is in the second person : " Thou art with me." It is 
worth the experience of death to have Christ in the 
second person ; the rod and the staff used for us, not by 
us, are a comfort. 

But why leave the field and enter a palace? He does 
not. Our ignorance leads us astray. Madam Mountford, 
born and reared in Palestine, tells us that the psalm is all 
in the open, no walls, no roof. The sheep has three ene- 
mies — poison plants, serpents, and wild beasts. The sheep 
cannot tell the poison plants from the green pastures. The 
shepherd leading into a new pasture plucks up the poison 
plants. Here and there a serpent waits. When the sheep 
seeks food he finds death. The shepherd pours hot fat 
into the hole, sealing the snake in his grave. Wild beasts 
lurk in the surrounding bushes. With sling, stones, and 
club he drives them far away. The table is prepared in 
the presence of enemies. 

The Door of the Sheep 

The setting sun throws deepening shadows over the 
fields, the sheep are led to the fold. The shepherd stands 
in the doorway. He is the door of the sheep. Each sheep 
is called by name. The rod is held across the entrance, 
and the strong sheep leap over it. Here comes one with 
a bruised head. He is anointed with oil. Here is one 
who missed his drink at the well. He is weak and faint. 
The shepherd fills the cup from the water in the bucket, 
the sheep plunges his face into the water, his cup runs 
over. 

" Goodness and mercy." Christ's collie dogs follow all 
the days. Christ sends goodness and mercy to guard the 
rearward. 

The " house of Jehovah " is where Jehovah is. Jacob 



MY SHEPHERD 177 

found him with the mountains for walls and the starry 
heavens for a roof. The king without the palace is more 
than the palace without the king. " The earth is his foot- 
stool," and the king is as near the footstool as to the 
throne. The place of his feet is glorious. 

The Shepherd's Portion 

If the shepherd owns the pasture and the sheep, to 
whom does the fleece belong? To the sheep or to the 
shepherd? I once saw a shepherd in the street of Alex- 
andria throw a sheep and shear him. The sheep was 
dumb. His nostrils quivered as the shears nipped, but 
the fleece belonged to the shepherd. 

Mesha, King of Moab, " was a sheepmaster, and ren- 
dered unto the King of Israel an hundred thousand lambs 
and an hundred thousand rams with the wool. ,, The 
King of Moab refused, and the war cost him the life of 
his son. Many a man has paid the price of the loss of 
his children's souls by holding back the fleece. 

We blame the profiteer, but what of the man who 
claims Christ for a shepherd and then withholds the 
fleece ? 

Louis XI " executed a solemn deed of ownership, ,, con- 
veying to the Virgin Mary the whole county of Boulogne 
in France, but reserved for himself all the revenues 
thereof. 

The League of Nations calls for reservations. The 
covenant of peace with Christ admits of no reservations. 

Achan, Gehazi, and Judas were profiteers. One got 
the leprosy, the second a military funeral, the third a rope 
and a field of blood. 

" Covetousness is idolatry." To whom does the fleece 
belong? 



PART II 
ADDRESSES 



I 

IS LIFE WORTH LIVING? 

Last century Mallock of England wrote a book on the 
question, "Is Life Worth Living?" A witty American 
reviewer replied, " That depends on the liver." Yes ! It 
depends on the liver and his environment and the adjust- 
ment he can make with his environment. Herbert Spen- 
cer wrote : " Life is a continuous adjustment between in- 
ternal relations and external relations." The sum of my 
internal relations makes up myself; the sum of my ex- 
ternal relations, my environment, and my life depends 
upon my ability to adjust myself properly to my environ- 
ment. 

The Problem of Adjustment 

In the book that made boyhood a delight and has filled 
manhood with sweet and gracious memories, Daniel De- 
foe heaves the hero of his story from the heart of a 
storm to the shore of the island. A night in the treetop 
gives Robinson a chance to rest his body and calm his 
mind, and the sea an opportunity to repent of her rude- 
ness. With the morning light, Robinson got himself to- 
gether, gathered what he could from the wreck, and later 
learned of his new home and his brother man. The ques- 
tion that faced Crusoe as he slipped out of the tree was, 
"Is life worth living?" That depended upon what he 
carried with him and found, and the adjustment he could 
make. We are all Robinson Crusoes, though we are not 
always so sharply conscious of our plight. 

181 



182 HONEST DEBTORS 

We come and come from a vague somewhere, 

Out from a sea that reels and rolls, 

Specked with barks of tiny souls; 
Souls that were launched on the other side 
And slipped from heaven on the ebbing tide. 

The question that faces each one is, " Is life worth 
living?" That depends upon what we bring with us, 
what we find, and the adjustment we can make; lungs to 
air; stomach to food and drink; eyes to light; ears to 
sound; mind to thought; heart to love; soul to God. If 
the adjustment is perfect the life will be complete; if im- 
perfect, incomplete. 

Whence and Whither? 

Straightway a man begins to think, to distinguish him- 
self and his surroundings, himself and his fellow men, 
he is faced by three serious questions : Whence came I ? 
Whither go I? What am I? Questions of origin, of 
destiny, of character. To the question of origin, philoso- 
phy, science, and religion each give an answer. 

Philosophy speaking through Plato says, " The soul is 
uncreated, eternal." The verb of life has three tenses — 
past, present, and future. The soul passes from one body 
to another as a man passes from house to house. The 
white light of philosophy falling on the prism of poetry 
in the hand of William Wordsworth says : 

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting ; 

The soul that rises with us, our life's star, 
Hath had elsewhere its setting, 

And cometh from afar. 
Not in entire forgetfulness, 
And not in utter nakedness, 
But trailing clouds of glory, do we come 
From God, who is our home. 



IS LIFE WORTH LIVING? 183 

While we are busy with philosophy, science comes along 
and leads us to the monkey-cage; not that man is as- 
cended, or descended, from the monkey, but both come 
from a common stock. The monkey is a case of arrested 
development. He went into the far country and never 
came back. Back of the common stock is the oyster ; back 
of the oyster, mud. Mud, monkey, man; and man, only 
organized mud on end, becoming mud again when ad- 
journed by death. With such an ancestry, be as good as 
you can between mud-puddles. 

Religion claims that man was created in the image and 
likeness of God; the top step in the long stairway that 
leads from dust to Deity ; the last link in the long chain 
that binds the footstool to the throne. One step is not 
the evolution from another, but a separate creation, ex- 
pressing a succession of thoughts. 

The Question of Character 

Facing the future, we ask " Whither ? " Philosophy 
says that we shall always be, because we always have 
been, uncreated — we are indestructible. Science says, " I 
do not know " ; man may have reached permanence, he 
may come together again after the adjustment by death, 
but I cannot promise. Religion says, " Being made in the 
image and likeness of God, man will share his immor- 
tality, he will last until God unweaves the web of life/' 
But the real question is not concerning origin, or des- 
tiny, but character. If I always was, then I ought to be 
as good as I can in the present stage. Choices create 
character; character determines destiny. 

If I came from mud, by the way of the oyster and the 
monkey, I ought to be better than either, that I may 
justify being a man. If I came by creation, I ought not 
to insult my Maker by falling below his plan for me. 



184 HONEST DEBTORS 

The Greeks went to a cave in the earth for wisdom. Over 
the entrance was a challenge : Gnothi seauton — " Know 
thyself." 

Know then thyself, presume not God to scan; 
The proper study of mankind is man. 

The best specimen for me to study is myself; the best 
specimen for you to study is yourself. It is pleasanter to 
study your neighbor. It is more profitable to study your- 
self. Mind your own business. Blessed is the man who 
mindeth his own business, for verily his business shall be 
minded. That I may mind my own business, I must un- 
derstand myself. If I were a chicken hatched by a duck, 
my stepmother could not lead me into the water; I have 
no webs between my toes. If I were a duck and hatched 
by a hen, she could not keep me from the water ; I have 
webs between my toes. The one who hatches cannot 
determine the destiny of the one she hatches. If men 
were as sensible as chickens they would not drown try- 
ing to swim ; or as ducks, they would not wear out their 
webs trying to scratch. 

Looking at myself I find a threefold being: body, mind, 
spirit. The body is the finest piece of mechanism made 
of matter. It is to the mind what the ship is to the sailor ; 
what tools are to the mechanic. Care for it; deal with 
it justly ; be fair to it; keep it in order. Once it is broken, 
the mind is bankrupt. Inside the body, giving it real 
value, is the mind. The mind is the standard of man. 
You buy hay by the ton, meat by the pound, land by the 
foot. You cannot measure mind by material standards. 
The measure of a man is not his waistband, but his hat- 
band. The value of a ring is not the gold, but the jewel. 
Keep the body under, the mind on top. Inside the mind 
is the spirit. There is a spirit in man, and the inbreath- 



IS LIFE WORTH LIVING? 185 

ing of the Almighty giveth him understanding. It is as 
easy to walk on the heights as in the valley, to be at home 
with God as with man. 

Limitations and Convictions 

Two things are true of every man : He must learn his 
own limitations and trust his own convictions. A sopho- 
more has not limitations; imagination and not judgment 
is on the throne. When I was a sophomore, it was my 
wise year. I knew more then than I have ever known 
since. I debated f oreordination and free will for an hour 
with my father. At the close of the argument, he said, 
" Remember, my boy, I am older than you are and have 
had more experience" I replied, " Don't you forget 
that I have traveled more widely than you have and have 
had more observation." Though you bray a fool in a 
mortar with a pestle, you will get only fool's dust. But 
do not be discouraged, all men have their limitations. 

Trust your own convictions. Learn to work out a 
problem without consulting a key, to make a translation 
without riding a pony. Better a mile on foot than ten 
miles in the saddle across the fields of literature. The 
camel will travel a week without water, absorbing the 
humps on its ow 7 n back. I know men who dare not ven- 
ture out of sight of water; they have no humps and no 
back-bone to put humps on. Some men are like radishes : 
they come ten in a bunch to have any market value. Such 
men, in a country town, hang around the store or post- 
office; in a city, join a club because there is nobody there 
when they are alone. It is a great day in the child's life 
when it sits alone, stands alone, walks alone. Learn to 
stand on your own feet ; do you own thinking, reach your 
own conclusions; crystallize your own convictions. Ac- 
cept and honor your responsibility for yourself. 

N 



186 HONEST DEBTORS 

Civilization 

Secondly, civilization. What is civilization? I do not 
know. Emerson says, " No man can define civilization/' 
Guizot wrote a history of civilization, but he did not at- 
tempt a definition. Let us describe it as " thought ex- 
pressed in matter " ; today a thought, tomorrow a build- 
ing; today a thought, tomorrow a machine; today a 
thought, tomorrow a ship ; today a thought, tomorrow a 
railroad; today a thought, tomorrow a city. Embodied 
thought is civilization. As you glove your hand, you 
glove your thought, and gloved thought is civilization. 
Crusoe's civilization was very simple — a few ropes, nails, 
screws, seeds, articles of furniture from a wrecked ship. 

This same Mallock wrote another book, "The New 
Paul and Virginia/' They too escaped from a wreck and 
landed on an island. Climbing the hill they found a 
French cottage, thoroughly furnished; one side a bread- 
fruit tree bearing French rolls, on the other side a butter 
tree bearing pats of butter. Their civilization was much 
more complex that Crusoe's ; and ours is much more com- 
plex than theirs. We are getting overcivilized. My 
father was reared in western Massachusetts, on the hills 
where the soil is so thin that they raise potatoes in slices, 
ready to fry, and the sheep's noses are like tooth-picks 
sharpened to find blades of grass between the stones. He 
and his brothers slept in the attic, and oftentimes the 
snow would sift through the shingles and make a white 
coverlid where the boys slept. When the call came for 
breakfast they would slip out of bed and dress in the 
room below where mother was getting breakfast. When 
I said to him, " What a shame to treat a boy like that," 
he replied, " Why I don't know, I never knew what it 
was to be tired until I was past fifty years old." In a 



IS LIFE WORTH LIVING? 187 

steam-heated house boys are born tired, and when they 
have growing pains eat their breakfast in bed. We are 
getting overcivilized, softened by luxury. The struggle 
in Europe is making as well as maiming men. 

Some years ago I had a friend who owned a house in 
Boston. It was thoroughly furnished from cellar to roof. 
She owned another house by the shore. I sat on the 
veranda with her one August afternoon in her shore 
home. It was a perfect day, not a cloud flecked the blue ; 
the tired waves slept on the white bosom of the beach. 
As I talked, she heaved a deep sigh. Fearing lest I was 
the cause, I said, "What is the trouble ?" She replied, 
" Oh dear, I wonder if while I am here enjoying myself, 
the buffalo-bugs are eating my parlor carpet." I have no 
house, " no foot of land I own, no cottage here below." 
I have no carpet, only a few rugs on rented floors, but I 
would rather live in a leased house on bare floors, than 
have buffalo-bugs in my brain for a summer vacation; 
and that is where she had them. " Martha, Martha, thou 
art careful and troubled about many things." Many 
things bring care and trouble. Life is not worth living 
when things crowd out thoughts, and the pedestal is on 
the shoulder of the statue. 

Material or Man 

Thirdly, raw material. We turn from civilization to 
raw material. Crusoe was " monarch of all he surveyed ; 
his right there was none to dispute." The island was his 
kingdom ; the sea that washed its shores, his servant ; the 
blue sky, his ministering angel. He lived on an island. 
We live on a continent. His raw material was limited; 
ours is unlimited. "To him who in the love of nature 
holds communion with her visible forms, she speaks a 
various language " ; but she is not worth listening to if 



188 HONEST DEBTORS 

she is our master and not our servant. When raw ma- 
terial masters man he is a slave, and the life of a slave is 
not worth living. 

Many years ago, a man built a house on the top of a 
sand-hill; at the foot he dug a well; over the well he 
rigged a sweep, and when his wife wanted water he went 
down the hill and carried it up to her. Because he loved 
her? Yes, and because he feared his neighbors. He 
could not bear to have them say " What a brute, to make 
his wife carry water." Blessed be neighbors. Jane, 
never trust yourself with John beyond the range of neigh- 
borhood pressure. Men mean well, but they are weak 
when outside of neighborhood pressure. A man is like a 
barrel, held together by hoops — outside pressure. A 
woman is like a tree, held together by the sap that builds 
from the inside. Another man bought the house. He 
rigged up a wind-mill, and winds that had whistled for a 
job for centuries were put to work to pump water. He 
put a reservoir in the attic. When his wife wanted water, 
she turned the faucet, and they had time to visit with each 
other, watching the sunset from the veranda. Life is 
worth living when forces of nature work for men. 

A ship was wrecked on an island in the Pacific. The 
storm that sunk the ship murdered the crew, but saved 
one life, and tossed the saved sailor far up on the beach. 
In the morning the black natives found the pale-faced 
stranger lying on his back above the ebbing tide. They 
thought he was white clear through — had fallen from the 
clouds. They brought him back to life ; made him their 
king and judge. The industry of the island consisted in 
catching turtles. When a man caught a turtle and turned 
it over it was his. All the labor he had put into the task 
brought him personal profit. There was no corporate 
capital between labor and raw material. Each respected 



IS LIFE WORTH LIVING ? 189 

the rights of all. A man caught and turned a turtle. 
When he sought it later in the day it was gone. He com- 
plained to the judge. All denied the theft; there were no 
witnesses. The judge bade them mark their turtles with 
asphalt which bubbled up on the island. One day a man 
turned a turtle, and it was marked; another was turned, 
and it was marked. Some one had cornered the turtle 
market. The mark was a short, straight mark — the sim- 
plest on the island. The man who had chosen that mark 
was called to account. He said : " Yes, the turtles come 
in with the tide; they crawl over a heap of stones to lay 
their eggs. I marked the tops of the stones, and the 
turtles did the rest." Life to that man was worth living. 
Use the tides; study the habits of the turtles, mark the 
stones, and the raw material becomes your finished pro- 
duct, and life is worth living. 

Your Fellow Man 

Fourthly, fellow man. When I was a boy I learned 
Longfellow's " Psalm of Life " : 

Lives of great men all remind us 

We can make our lives sublime, 
And, departing, leave behind us 

Footprints on the sands of time; 

Footprints, that perhaps another, 
Sailing o'er life's solemn main, 
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother, 
Seeing, shall take heart again. 

That is good poetry, but when Robinson Crusoe saw foot- 
prints on the sands, he did not take hope. Frightened, he 
sought his cave, closed the door, and terrified — waited. 
But he had to meet the man who made the footprints ; so 
must we. Many a man has learned self-control, the 



190 HONEST DEBTORS 

mastery of civilization and raw material, but has failed 
in managing men. 

Theories of Life 

There are two theories of life, the selfish and the sacri- 
ficial. The selfish theory resolves life in a whirlpool, with 
self at the center of the suction. The sacrificial theory 
heaves life into a hill that challenges the clouds and com- 
pels them to minister to the valleys waiting far below. 
One theory says, " Do all the good you can, in all the 
ways you can, to all the folks you can." The other theory 
says, " Get all the good you can, from all the folks you 
can, in all the ways you can, and keep all you get/' 

The one is the orange theory of life. I am very thirsty. 
Here is an orange, a golden globe of luscious juice. It 
fits my hands ; I have it in my power. I squeeze it until 
all the fiber and juice are separate. I cut a hole in the 
rind ; I adjust the hole to my mouth and suck. When my 
thirst is satisfied, there is nothing but the rind left. I 
tear it open to get the last drop ; I throw it down to my 
feet and go my way. I return a half an hour later, step 
on the forgotten rind, slip up, and break my back. Many 
a man has broken his back slipping up on the life he has 
wrecked for business gain. 

^Esop, the writer of fables, tells of a monkey who 
wanted roasted chestnuts, but he did not want to scorch 
his hands getting them out of the ashes. As our wants 
multiply, we seek to use others and profit by their work. 
The monkey thrust the cat's paw into the ashes only once, 
for cats hold parliaments in backyards, while the world 
sleeps, and give each other points. The fallacy of the 
fable lies in this, that men are not divided into monkeys 
and cats. We are all monkeys together, and while we 
fight, the chestnuts go on roasting, and when the fight 



IS LIFE WORTH LIVING ? 191 

is finished we have ashes for dividends. When the 
nations of Europe have finished their fight for a place 
in the sun, the day will be dying, and amid the gathering 
shadows they will rest in the darkness. 

There is another fable of a fox who invited a stork 
to dinner. The feast was a thin soup, in a shallow dish. 
The stork stood on one foot and watched while the fox 
ate. The next day the stork gave a return dinner. The 
soup was in a long narrow-necked jar. The fox feasted 
on memory that day. " Be not deceived ; God is not 
mocked ; for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also 
reap." 

The other theory of life is the sacrificial. It is beauti- 
fully told in the story of the Holy Grail. The Grail is the 
cup used by our Lord at the Supper. It was carried to 
Britain by Joseph of Arimathea. It disappeared one day, 
when a man touched it whose heart treasured an impure 
thought. Then came King Arthur's court, the Round 
Table, the search for the Holy Grail. Tennyson tells the 
story in his " Idylls of the King." I like better James 
Russell Lowell's " Vision of Sir Launfal." Sir Launfal 
would join the search for the Holy Grail. It was the 
last night in the castle. The knight slept on rushes in 
the hall. As he slept, he dreamed. In his dream he 
arose, donned his armor, mounted his horse and rode 
away. A leper crouched by the wayside and stretched a 
crippled hand for an alms. The knight turned his face 
away from the loathsome sight, tossed a gold coin to the 
beggar, and sped on his way. The beggar picked up the 
coin and threw it after the knight, for gold without love 
carries a curse. The years past and Sir Launfal returned, 
an old man. His horse was dead; his armor laid aside. 
Standing beneath the castle walls he demanded entrance, 
saying, " I am Sir Launfal." The sentinel laughing, said, 



192 HONEST DEBTORS 

" Sir Launfal hath been dead this many-a-day." The 
knight turned away, found a brook, quenched his thirst, 
took a crust from his leathern pouch, and as he ate felt 
a Presence. At his side sat the leper. Without a word 
he stooped and filled the cup and gave it to the leper, and 
shared his crust When the leper's lip touched the water, 
it turned to purple wine; when he broke the crust, it 
turned to wheaten loaf, and the leper stood, the Son of 
God. Smiling on the knight, he said : 

Who gives himself with his alms feeds three, 
Himself, his hungering neighbor, and Me. 

The knight awoke, the morning sun flooded the hall ; the 
horse stamped impatient in the stall; the spiders spun 
their webs in the unused armor on the wall. Sir Launfal 
had found the Holy Grail. 

The true Lord's Supper is not in bread and wine, in 
church or cathedral, but in the giving of self for service 
to others; each giving his body, his blood, to meet the 
needs of the age in which he lives. Is life worth living? 
A thousand times, " Yes ! " when you have mastered self, 
civilization, raw material, and learned to minister to your 
fellow man. 



II 

CHARACTER A CREDIT MAN'S ASSET 1 

Mr, Toastmaster, Gentlemen, and Guests: 

It is a pleasure to step from the still air of delightful 
study into the active arena of life, where the dust is thick 
and the air hot with strife. Crossing the Atlantic, it is 
a treat to leave the wind-swept deck and stand where men 
feed coal to the leviathan of the great deep, and masters 
manage the machinery that determines the speed. I feel 
as though I were close to the heart of business, near the 
men who determine the speed of the Ship of State when 
I look into your faces. 

Character as an Asset is my theme. It is pleasant and 
profitable to stand where the cloud trusts her child to the 
mountain, to watch while the struggling spring breaks 
over its barriers and becomes a babbling brook, to follow 
it in its struggle, broadening and deepening, till it be- 
comes a river, nourishing cities, driving machinery, bear- 
ing the commerce of a continent on its back, and finally 
surrendering its trust to the sea. 

When a corporation seeks an employee it wishes to 
know his character. Habits are the lines that make char- 
acter. We form habits, and then habits form us, and dis- 
figure or transfigure us. The soil takes in a seed and the 
seed takes up the soil, so a man does a thing in a certain 
way, and then the way transforms the man. 

1 An address delivered at the Ninth Annual Meeting of the Buffalo Credit 
Men's Association, Thursday evening, January n, 1906. 

193 



194 HONEST DEBTORS 

Character a Composite 

Every river has its own character, this character is its 
asset. This character is made up of heredity and envi- 
ronment. The life it starts with, the increment it gathers. 
Every pebble polished yields something of its substance, 
every root fed pays tribute, till the stream becomes a part 
of all that it has touched. Every spring at Saratoga is a 
combination of the hidden water in the heart of the earth, 
and the elements it has taken on its journey out to the 
open, and each spring has its character and works out its 
life. Every river has its character as well. Niagara 
River has a national reputation as an organizer of 
choruses, a builder of rainbows, and a generator of elec- 
tricity, but its waters need to be baked, boiled, and filtered 
before fit to drink; unless restrained it has too much 
power. The Platte, like a famous candidate, broad, 
sweet, shallow, has its work of irrigation, but not of com- 
merce or manufacturing. Men, like streams, have their 
characters, made up of heredity and environmen?, original 
and acquired capital, and this capital is the man's asset. 

Words, like men, have biographies. They start out 
with one meaning and acquire several. This word char- 
acter stood for an engraver's tool at first, a bit of steel 
which lengthened a workman's finger, through it he ex- 
pressed his thought, this thought engraved upon metal 
plate or stone cube gave it character, this engraved sur- 
face inked and pressed upon a sheet of paper imparted its 
characters ; thus we have engravings and books of certain 
characters. The character of engraving or book is the 
sum total of marks and the thought in and behind the 
marks. Then we take the word thus enriched back to 
the man, and charge him with a character. His character 
is the sum total of the lines made by thinking, acting, liv- 



CHARACTER A CREDIT MAN'S ASSET 195 

ing. The steel tool has two ends ; while the engraver ex- 
presses the thought on the plate through one end, he im- 
presses the same thought on his own mind with the other 
end, he markets character and thus becomes responsible 
for it. This is a triangular question. I am one angle, the 
company is the second, the young man is the third. " To 
thine own self be true." After the letter is written I must 
live with myself, face myself every morning, sleep with 
myself every night, live with myself every day. I must tell 
the truth as I know it, or soon I cannot know the truth 
when I see it. I must be true to the firm, consulting their 
interests; I must be true to my friend, for if he is not 
worthy of the place, then I injure all concerned when I say 
he is. Fortunately for all concerned he is worthy. I can 
gladly hold the door open while he enters in. How do I 
know? I know the habit-lines that make up his char- 
acter. He has a good home and a good wife. From 
Eve's day down, woman has led man either into or out of 
Paradise. 

When I see a man following his wife out, I'll not recom- 
mend him as a gardener, for I know he cannot be trusted 
to guard the fruit. Let him farm outside, not play 
gardener inside Eden. The other day on the street-car, 
a friend said to me, " I have just had to call one of my 
men down." " Why, what's the trouble? " " He is liv- 
ing beyond his income." Of course that means, he must 
get the balance from his employer, unknown to him, or 
from the men he sells to, or by cheating his creditor. 
The man who lives beyond his income is extravagant, 
either at home, because of his wife, or out of the home, in 
spite of her. If outside, he may be reformed; if inside, 
you have a double contract, and cannot well touch the 
other party. Ships that carry more sail than ballast are 
apt to capsize; an extravagant wife is too much sail for 



196 HONEST DEBTORS 

ballast. Mothers and wives either make or unmake us 
men. A fool can be dragged to success by a wise wife, 
but a wise man is often driven to failure by a fool wife. 
" If she be weak, slight-natured, miserable, how shall 
men grow ? " You say, " You have no right in my 
home." Ah, sirs, but I have a right to the product of 
your home when I am asked to market it. No honest 
man can urge the claims of a man to a responsible posi- 
tion who is yoked up with an extravagant wife 

To Take a Man's Measure 

A man's measure is not taken during his working 
hours ; many a horse will pull well in harness, but is wild 
in the pasture. Many a cow gives a good mess of milk 
but kicks it all over in a spirit of sport, and hooks down 
the bars when in the pasture. A man's measure is taken 
during his leisure. When at work another sets the pace, 
when at play he sets his own pace. What does he do, 
not when he must, but when he can? Does he gamble? 
Then all the virtues known among men will not float him, 
with that hole in his boat. No man will trust you with 
his treasure if you fool with your own. Does he drink ? 
He may be trusted with a wheelbarrow, but not with an 
automobile, nor a locomotive. Pickled pig's feet may find 
a market, but not pickled human brains. 

Who are his boon companions ? "A man is known 
by the company he keeps." Not the men he works with, 
but the man he plays with. A street-car conductor is not 
judged by the men he collects fare from, but the men he 
seeks when off duty. A postman is not judged by the 
houses he leaves letters at, but the houses he enters when 
his route is ended. Leisure, not labor, brands a man. A 
small fly spoils a big pot of ointment, and " A little leaven 
leaveneth the whole lump." 



CHARACTER A CREDIT MAN'S ASSET 197 

Character is not only the sum of the lines made by the 
steel point in hours of labor, but by the rust spot formed 
by moisture in the hours of careless leisure. If you can- 
not keep good company, because unknown, then spend 
your leisure hours with the great men of the past ; books 
welcome all comers, when you reach the great you will 
be worth knowing. 

A large importing concern bought largely of English 
houses. An American manufacturer competed with the 
English house in one of its products. The head of the 
house sought the buyer of the importing house and said, 
" You buy largely of so and so? * " Yes." " Well, we 
make quite as good an article, and will meet their prices ; 
and besides that, we will give ten per cent, for yourself, 
if you will give us the order." " All right ; if your quality 
is as good, and your prices are the same, I'll give you the 
order." The order was given, the bill sent, the per cent, 
paid. Not in a check. Like the way of a bird in the air, 
of a fish in the sea, of a snake on the rock, is the way 
of money paid as a bonus. Checks leave trails, money 
casts no shadow. Two years passed. The manufacturer 
sought the buyer. He was a little the worse for liquor — 
frankly, men, I never saw a man who was the better for 
it — first he had the drink, then the drink had him, and he 
was feeling ugly. " Look here ; your last orders are not 
so large as usual." " No ! your goods are not up to con- 
tract ; you agreed to make goods of a certain quality, you 
aren't keeping up." " But you are my man, aren't you? " 
" What do you mean by that? " " I pay you ten per cent., 
don't I ? " " Yes ! but your goods are not up to stand- 
ard." " Say ! I want to see your boss." " All right, 
come in, I'll introduce you." They entered the office to- 
gether, he was introduced. The buyer said, " This gen- 
tleman has come to complain ; before you hear him call in 



198 HONEST DEBTORS 

the head bookkeeper with the journal." He came in. 
" Now this man will tell you that he has paid me ten per 
cent, on every bill we have bought; that is true." The 
head of the importing house then turned and asked, 
" When did you pay and how much ? " Items were given. 
The buyer then said to the bookkeeper : " Consult the 
journal, and you will find the same amounts on the same 
date credited to the house. My salary covers my ser- 
vices, the ten per cent, went to the credit of the house; 
it was my business to buy as cheaply as I could." The 
complainant shuddered, his boat had struck a rock. He 
found an honest man where he thought he had bought a 
thief. "Is that all, Mr. S— ?" Then the buyer took 
him by the collar and escorted him to the door. The next 
year the buyer was taken into the firm, today he is an 
equal partner; last January his share of profit was 
$37,500. And his character was his asset. 

Two young people loved and married, put their savings 
together and stocked a country store, the store and stock 
took all their funds. The young wife borrowed $200 
of her rich uncle to keep them over the summer, there 
was no margin for insurance, fire came, the store went, 
the stock disappeared. She wrote her uncle, and he was 
furious, thought the husband had worked him through 
the wife. The young fellow hired a small cottage out of 
the saved stuff, and went to work. He found a place in 
a neighboring city, in the wholesale store where he had 
bought his stock. Arose at five in the morning — break- 
fast at six— all day in the store — ten dollars a week. The 
wife did her own work. They saved and sent the uncle a 
dollar a week. He was mad at first, thought the dollar 
was simply bait for catching a larger loan. After a bit 
he sent the money back, saying he could afford the loss. 
It was returned, with the word they could not afford not 



CHARACTER A CREDIT MAN'S ASSET 199 

to make good. The uncle's golden wedding came; he 
sent an invitation to the young couple; the return mail 
brought two dollars' congratulations, but the statement 
that they could not afford the trip while in debt. He took 
the early train for the city, called on the head of the house 
employing the young man (an old-time friend), told the 
story of the struggle, the integrity, and said, " Don't you 
think it a little hard to keep such a man on ten dollars a 
week?" "Yes, I do! but I didn't know the man; we 
need just such a man in the office, and we'll pay him 
$1,400 a year." His character was his asset. 

Character at bottom, is the only asset that stands. For- 
tunes come and go, character stands. Men make money, 
but God makes men. The earth is full of his treasures — 
generations will dig it out — but the lack is of men. And 
you older men have no right to ask of young men what 
you are not willing to give them. If it is wrong for young 
men to be extravagant, it is wrong for mature men. If 
it is wrong for young men to gamble, it is wrong for 
mature men. If it is wrong for young men to be impure, 
it is wrong for older men. A good example will do more 
to make character than all claims for it. Morality does 
not depend upon money. 

Right is right, since God is God, 

And right the day must win. 
To doubt would be disloyalty, 

To falter would be sin. 

What constitutes a State? Men, high-minded men. 

Men who their duties know, 

But know their rights, and knowing dare maintain. 

Adams, Jerome, Folk, Roosevelt, are where they are, 
because they are what they are. Character is the asset 
the State seeks in trusting men. 



200 HONEST DEBTORS 

God give us men ! a time like this demands, 

Strong minds, great hearts, true faith, and ready hands ; 

Men whom the lust of office does not kill; 
Men whom the spoils of office cannot buy; 

Men who possess opinions and a will; 
Men who have honor, men who will not lie; 

Men who can stand before a demagogue, 
And damn his treacherous flatteries without winking! 

Tall men, sun-crowned, who live above the fog 
In public duty and in private thinking; 

For while the rabble, with their thumb-worn creeds, 

Their large professions and their little deeds, 
Mingle in selfish strife — Lo! Freedom weeps. 
Wrong rules the land and waiting Justice sleeps. 



Ill 

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE 

" God, having of old times spoken to the fathers in the 
prophets by divers portions and in divers manners, hath 
at the end of these days spoken unto us in a Son," writes 
an unknown defender of the faith in the early church. 
May we expect another message? Is the silence of God 
to be broken again? The Son promised to send another 
Paraclete, but his mission is limited; it is to glorify 
Christ, to take of his things and show them unto us; he 
is to lead into all truth, but the Son is Truth. As the 
electric current flashes the pictured slide on the waiting 
canvas, so the Paraclete flashes the Son of God on the 
waiting soul, but it is a silent process. As the south 
wind, saturated with warmth, breaks down the frost and 
frees the sleeping seeds, so the Paraclete applies the 
warmth of the Sun of Righteousness to sin-bound souls, 
and starts the seed of the Word to growth and harvest. 
Has the mind of God been fully uttered, has he made his 
last utterance? The churches abide by the Book, and 
seek to be subject to the Spirit. This abiding and sub- 
jection seeks and finds utterance through unnumbered 
pulpits and books seeking to explain the message spoken 
centuries ago. 

The Rise of Christian Science 

All preachers and writers are like members of an or- 
chestra; the music is furnished, the leader wields the 
baton, instruments differ, temperaments differ, but all 
o 201 



202 HONEST DEBTORS 

seek to render the same music under the control of the 
Spirit. In 1886 a new voice broke the silence of the 
centuries. A new Deborah sat under a new palm tree and 
prophesied; the prophecy is not an interpretation, but a 
revelation. The new prophetess writes in the " Senti- 
nel," May 23, 1901 : 

Science and Health makes it plain to all Christian Scientists 
that the manhood and womanhood of God have already been 
revealed in a degree through Christ Jesus and Christian Science, 
his two witnesses. What remains to lead on the centuries and 
reveal my successor, is man in the image and likeness of the 
Father-Mother God, man the generic term for mankind. 

We have a new score and a new leader. Preachers and 
teachers simply hold up a prism to analyze the white light 
that came from Christ ; here is a new flood of light from 
the uplifted countenance of God. Not a witness to Christ, 
but a coequal witness with Christ. 

The new testimony is the " Key to Scriptures. ,, A 
locked treasure is not a treasure, the key is as essential 
as the chest and treasure. As Christ carries the keys of 
death and Hades, so the book carries the key to all that 
prophets and Son have spoken. 

The Prophetess 

Little is known concerning the birth, training, appear- 
ance of the prophets through whom God spoke to the 
fathers. Very little is known concerning the birth, train- 
ing, habits, and personal appearance of the Son. The 
message is much, the man little. " He is the true and 
faithful witness/' The testimony convicts or frees, not 
the personality of the witness. The witness is the am- 
bassador, the way, the door. We know much of Mrs. 
Eddy — birthplace, parents, home, early training, suffer- 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE 203 

ing, escape. From cradle to grave she has been in the 
limelight. " This thing was not done in a corner," the 
X-ray of publicity lays bare the hidden structure of the 
woman and her message. 

She was born July 16, 1821, at Bow, New Hampshire, 
five miles from Concord. Her father, mother, brothers, 
and sisters were well known and highly esteemed. The 
Baker family held a high place in the town, measured by 
the double New England standard of character and 
property. The grandfather was the heaviest tax-payer 
in town; her father and uncle lived together on the in- 
herited farm. Mark Baker, Mary's father, was a justice 
of the peace, a deacon in the Concord Church, a school- 
committeeman, and for many years chaplain of the State 
militia. The first of the family came to Charlestown in 
1634. Her mother was the daughter of Deacon Nathaniel 
Ambrose, who gave the money for the first Congrega- 
tional Church in Pembroke. Filtered blood ran in Mary's 
veins. Blood will tell in human as in brute, else there 
can be no advance in civilization. The flesh-born is 
flesh, yet there is one kind of flesh of beast and another 
of man, and many kinds of human flesh. Three brothers 
and two sisters, born within ten years, had exhausted the 
vitality of the mother, and Mary was mortaged to sick- 
ness from her birth. She was born without the birth- 
right of physical health. Moses was spared because he 
was a goodly child. Mary was spared because she had 
Christian parents. Her want of health barred her from 
the public school; mother, grandmother, and brother 
Albert taught her by turns. The brother shared with her 
during his vacations what he had learned during the 
college term. Latin and metaphysics were favorite 
studies. Under his instruction she took up moral science, 
natural philosophy, Latin, Greek, Hebrew. Like Samuel 



204 HONEST DEBTORS 

the prophet, she heard voices, and often replied to her 
mother. Answering as Samuel did, the voices ceased. 

The father was a devout and active Christian; the 
pastor a frequent visitor to the home, his visit was her 
opportunity. Her Bible was her chief literary companion. 
When she read that Daniel prayed often daily, she fol- 
lowed his example, and made record of her prayers. Her 
letters to her brother in college were girlish imitations of 
Bible style. When she was twelve years of age her father 
proposed membership in the church; she objected, not 
being ready. A severe quarrel followed; she had her 
way, and he had his say, declaring she had ten devils. 
When Mary was thirteen the family moved to Tilton. 
At fifteen she had prolonged theological discussions with 
the pastor, finally joining the church. Here she attended 
a private school, studying rhetoric. 

In 1843, she was married to G. W. Glover, of Charles- 
ton, South Carolina. She was a widow within a year, 
and soon after his death a son was born. The next five 
years she spent with her father and sister, sick most of 
the time, teaching a little, writing for a New Hampshire 
paper. She became interested in spiritualism and mag- 
netism. Living with her sister she became a confirmed 
invalid suffering from severe spinal complaint. In 1853, 
she married a Doctor Patterson, a traveling dentist. 
Denied the presence of her son, she mourned the denial 
deeply. In 1862, she went to Portland, Maine, to be 
treated by Doctor Quimby, a mesmerist and pyschologist. 

His theory was that the mind gives immediate form to the 
animal spirit, and that the animal spirit gives form to the body 
as soon as the less plastic elements of the body are able to 
assume that form. Therefore, his first course in the treatment 
of a patient is to sit down beside him and put himself en rap- 
port with him, which he does without producing the mesmeric 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE 205 

sleep. He says that in every disease the animal spirit, or spirit- 
ual form, is somewhat disconnected from the body, that it im- 
parts to him all its grief and the cause of it, which may have 
been mental trouble or shock to the body, as overfatigue, exces- 
sive cold or heat, etc. This impresses the mind with anxiety, 
and the mind reacting on the body produces disease. With this 
spirit form Doctor Quimbly converses and endeavors to w r in it 
away from its grief, and when he succeeds in doing so it dis- 
appears and reunites with the body. Thus is commenced the first 
step, toward recovery. This union frequently lasts but a short 
time, when the spirit again appears, exhibiting some new phase 
of its trouble. With this he again persuades and contends until 
he overcomes it, and it disappears as before. Thus two shades 
of trouble have disappeared from the mind and consequently 
from the animal spirit, and the body already has commenced its 
effort to come into a state in accordance with them. 1 

When Mrs. Patterson visited Doctor Quimby he had 
dropped mesmerism, added faith cure, and convinced the 
patient that he was a mediator between her and God. 

She spent three weeks with the doctor, copied his notes, 
talked with him for many hours. She returned home 
cured. For a time she praised the doctor highly, then 
denied that she owed her system to him. Her sister 
visited the doctor and declared the whole thing to be 
sheer " bosh." 

Going to live in Lynn, she slipped on the ice, sought 
medical treatment, was given up by the doctor, and dis- 
covered Christian Science, walking down-stairs, and de- 
claring she had found the secret of health. 

In 1873, she secured a divorce on good grounds, and 
lived around among friends. 

In 1870, she issued her first pamphlet on " The Science 
of Man," and began to teach two students the new 
Science. In 1875, she issued her first edition of " Science 
and Health," and bought a house in Lynn where she 

1 Bangor Jeffersonian, 1857. 



206 HONEST DEBTORS 

opened a school and held her first church service. In 

1877, she married Mr. Eddy, her business manager. In 

1878, she opened her work in Boston. The next year, at 
nearly sixty years of age, she moved to Boston. August 
23, 1879, she incorporated the Church of Christ, Scientist, 
with twenty-six members. Now there is a membership 
of many thousands, a property worth millions, a maga- 
zine, a daily paper, a board of directors, and a guaranteed 
future for many years. 

The Prophecy 

Standing in a cathedral, in the dim religious light that 
falls through windows richly dight, one sees figures, 
crosses, crowns, anchors, in color. The white light of 
the Scriptures falls upon the Christian Science worshiper 
through the teachings of Mrs. Eddy ; so long as the mem- 
bers of the church are willing to worship behind her 
interpretation of Scripture the church will persist. The 
Koran keeps the Mohammedan faith intact. Its thoughts 
mold the Mohammedan world. The Golden Bible keeps 
the Morman church solid. The Roman Catholic interpre- 
tation of the Bible keeps the church intact. Protestantism 
smites the prism of denominationalism, and each group 
chooses its own color. So long as " Science and Health " 
is held between the Bible and the worshiper the cult will 
endure. The book is called " Key to Scriptures," but 
what is the key to the book ? What is the ruling thought 
in the scheme? "Home, Sweet Home " is played with 
variations, but there is a controlling theme. Gothic ar- 
chitecture has many modifications, but however modified 
we see the Gothic scheme. As the cross dominates Saint 
Marks in Venice, so one thought dominates " Science 
and Health." Gargoyles do not destroy Gothic architec- 
ture, though they divert attention from its stately beauty. 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE 207 

The curious statements in the Mrs. Eddy's system do not 
affect the controlling principle. 

In her thinking Mrs. Eddy stands beside God and 
looks out upon the universe. We stand on the footstool 
and look toward the throne, she stands by the throne and 
looks out at the universe. We think with the earth as a 
center, we have shadows caused by turning; she stands 
in the sun where there is no shadow caused by turning. 
She assumes God's point of view. The Assumption of the 
Virgin Mary is based upon the apocryphal tradition. The 
assumption of Mary Baker Eddy rests upon her own as- 
sertion. The prophets assumed to speak for Jehovah. 
The Son asserted that he spoke for God. Mary Eddy 
assumed to speak from God's point of view. We may 
challenge the assumption, but need to understand it to 
get her point of view. She says : 

God is the Great I AM; the all-knowing, all-seeing, all-acting, 
all-wise, all-loving, and eternal Principle [because person implies 
limitation, all the persons we know are limited] ; Mind, Soul, 
Spirit, Life, Truth, Love, Substance, Intelligence. God is one 
God, infinite and perfect, and cannot become finite and imperfect. 

In Divine Science man is the true image of God. 

I, or Ego, Principle, Spirit, Soul, incorporeal, unerring, im- 
mortal, and eternal mind. There is but one I, or Us, but one 
principle or Mind, governing all existence, yet man and woman 
are unchanged forever in their individual characters, even as 
numbers never blend with each other, though they are governed 
by one Principle. All the objects of God's creation reflect one 
Mind; and whatever reflects not this one Mind, is false and 
erroneous, even the belief that life, substance, and intelligence are 
both mental and material. 

This great truth is illustrated by an analogy. The Master 
was always likening the kingdom of God to visible things, 
speaking parables, drawing parallels; "like" was often 
on his lips. 



208 HONEST DEBTORS 

This Great Original and his image, is like this : Here is 
a great mirror, a man stands before it, his image greets 
him, duplicates his motions, advances, retreats, moves to 
and fro. It has no real being aside from his being. If 
he were not, it could not be. So God is eternal Being, 
and man is his eternal image. Man shares God's eternity, 
is the spiritual reflection of an Eternal Spirit. God and 
man are thus coexistent, and these two are all there is in 
the universe, to God. 

From the beginning man was content to image God, 
had no consciousness of self. Suddenly he came to self- 
consciousness, lost God-consciousness; became as the 
gods. Lost God and found self. But God did not lose 
man. The child's dream is no reality to the watching 
mother; she sees the child, the sleeping child sees the 
dream figures. The delirium of the patient is unreal to 
the nurse, she sees the patient, the patient sees his own 
world. The child awakes, the dream fades, the mother is 
the one great reality; the patient is healed, the insanity 
passes, he sees the real world, outside himself. 

So God sees only his own reflection, or image; this 
dream, this delusion is not real to God, so not really 
real. The fog which the sea sends up is real to the sea, 
so real that it shuts out the stars and sun; the sea rolls 
in the dim gray light, but the stars and sun shine on ; by 
and by the fog dissipates, and the sea comes back again to 
the light. The darkness on the side of the earth turned 
from the sun is not real to the sun, it shines right on, 
pours its streams of light steadily forth; when the earth 
turns back again it gets what the sun had all the time 
been giving. God sees his own image through all the 
fog and darkness, and by and by man comes back to God. 
The entire system of Mrs. Eddy is based upon this as- 
sumption, that she shares and states God's point of view. 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE 209 

When she says matter is unreal, suffering is unreal, sin 
is unreal, she means to God. 

Man, the image and reflection, losing God, finding self, 
asserting self, becomes in turn a creator. The image of 
man has no power, the image of God has well-nigh God's 
power. He is Intelligence, Mind, Soul, Spirit. 

Dr. William Hanna Thompson says : 

The truth is that man is as little included in the limitations 
of animal life as an archangel would be if he visited this earth. 
Man is already equipped with an archangel's powers, as he would 
prove if only he had the time to do so, instead of merely the few 
and ever-hampered years of his earthly existence. 

This image, endowed with the powers of an archangel, 
creates his own body. The body is the reflection of man, 
as man is the reflection of God. Horace Bushnell has a 
sermon on u The Dignity of Human Nature shown from 
its Ruins. " He points out the mighty ruins of cities, 
kingdoms, religions, the awful passions, the mighty am- 
bitions of man. We need to recall the fact that all build- 
ings, literature, art, music, architecture, forms of govern- 
ment, come from the mind of man, as all rivers come 
from the sea. All things were put under man; we see 
not yet all things put under him, but we see Jesus, and 
Jesus is the Son of man, and all he is we may become, 
all he has we may share, for we are " heirs of God, and 
joint heirs with Jesus Christ." He is the Vine, we are 
the branches. He sits on the throne with God, we are 
to sit on thrones with him. Mrs. Eddy claims that all this 
power is now and here, has been as long as man has 
been, eternally ; that the human body is the expression of 
mortal mind. The spider spins its web out of its own 
body ; man spins his body out of his own stuff. It is real 
to man, unreal to God. The man God made is Spirit; 



210 HONEST DEBTORS 

the man man made is flesh, and so unreal. Then man 
made the earth as the sculptor makes the pedestal to set 
the statue on, or the railroad manager constructs the 
road-bed to run the train on. The man made the visible 
universe ; it is as much the expression of mortal mind as 
the body itself; God is man's heredity, but he makes his 
own environment. 

The building is an expression of mortal mind, the 
bricks are the expression of mortal mind, this we can 
understand, for they embody thought, and were not until 
man made them; but the clay is also an expression of 
mortal mind. The artist paints the picture, man weaves 
the canvas, makes the brushes ; but man made the cotton, 
and the paint; everything that appeals to the senses is 
the output of man, who is the expression of God. Man 
is as eternal as God ; matter is by man, for man, and has 
no reality to God. Hence it follows that the life lived in 
matter is unreal to God, then all suffering in the flesh 
has no reality to God. An aviator can feel the rhythm 
of the airship, and knows by feeling whether the machine 
is working aright, for man made it. But God takes no 
interest in airships, for he did not make them. The earth 
is a great airship, made by man, launched by man, man- 
aged by man, but unreal to God. Hence the suffering 
in the body is unknown to God, and what is unknown to 
God is really unreal. 

The Truth in the System 

Whatever truth there may be in this teaching, this we 
all recognize. Matter is not to God what it is to man. 
Matter in its present form is not eternal, it was not what 
it is, it will not continue to be what it is. Nature is that 
which is always coming to be, being born — nanciscor, 
natus. The will of God was the womb of matter, and the 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE 211 

will of God will be the tomb of matter. Matter is to man 
a condition, a limitation. You wish to make a call on a 
man, you do not know whether he is in, you ring the bell, 
ask the maid, she replies that he is ; you are shown to a 
room, take a seat, the man enters. You do not know 
what he is thinking ; when he speaks words may tell, may 
mask thoughts. You do not see each other, " this mortal 
coil " hides, and yet displays, the current of thought. The 
current turns to heat, light, power, or is shut off through 
words. He may speak his mind, may not. You do not 
know your own mind, much less his mind. In thinking, 
as in weather, you deal with probabilities. You may 
change your mind, rather your decision. The wall shuts 
you from knowledge as to his being in the house, the 
walls of flesh shut you from knowledge as to what is in 
the mind. Not so with God. He knows whether a man 
is in a room or not; he knows the thoughts and intents 
of the heart. His word pierces to the dividing asunder 
of joints and marrow, discerns the thoughts and intents 
of the heart; but his word could not do that if he had not 
known before he spoke the word ; the thought or knowl- 
edge put into the word must first have been in the mind 
of the speaker. The wireless operator on shipboard 
knows the message that is unknown to all others on board 
the same ship. God knows the thought- waves that beat 
out and out through the universe. He knows the 
thoughts of the heart before they have come to human 
consciousness. Christ knew what was in man. If mat- 
ter is not to God what it is to man, what is it ? Is it any- 
thing to him? Man's interpretation of matter is his own; 
the seed interprets the universe into the life it has, and 
expresses that interpretation in its own limitations. Is 
man's interpretation of the universe its creation? To 
him, yes. The pumpkin-seed and the kernel of corn are 



212 HONEST DEBTORS 

planted in the same bit of earth, warmed by the same 
sun, moistened by the same rain; each builds up its own 
body, creates its own expression; neither can understand 
the task of the other. They root in the same hill; one 
builds a straight shaft of life, the other a creeping vine ; 
if you could find the thought of each, you would find it 
could not understand the other. Take man, in the image 
and likeness of God, spiritually ; can he also make his own 
body, his own earth, his own universe? If he can, will 
it be real to the Being whom he images? If the body, 
earth, universe, are not real to God in the sense they are 
to me, what do I know about their reality to him? If 
the body were real to God as it is to man, he could not 
see through it to know the thoughts. The same life 
crawls a caterpillar and flies a butterfly. The same soul 
has a psychic and a pneumatic body. " There is a psychic 
body, there is a pneumatic body." But God is not a 
psychic, the psychic is the image of the pneumatic. Can 
God, the Great Pneuma, know anything about the matter 
that cribs, cabins, and confines the soul ? What is matter, 
anyway? A mode of motion, of what? No man knows. 
Heat is a mode of motion, light is a mode of motion, 
electricity is a mode of motion, and the same unknown 
force passes from one to the other by increased rapidity 
of motion. The most solid matter becomes fluid and gas 
in turn, subjected to heat ; ice, water, vapor, invisible gas 
are all the same in changing form. 

Rock is very solid, water is fluid, air is a gas. The 
bed of the Niagara Falls is rock ; the water falling upon 
it gains solidity enough by rapidly falling to wear it 
away, and wind rushing up the gorge gets solidity enough 
to push the water back and hold the cataract in leash. A 
western cyclone is air in motion ; moving rapidly enough, 
it destroys a town. Matter is a mode of motion. 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE 213 

A steel rail is very solid, but it is made up of atoms of 
matter in rapid motion; electricity is a mode of motion, 
touching the solid bar it turns it into tears of shining 
metal. The most solid form of matter may be vaporized 
and sent below the horizon of sense by the touch of an 
electric current. Once we were taught that the atom, the 
indivisible bit of matter, was the unit of value ; the brick 
that, built up with other bricks, made the wall of visible 
matter. This atom was never found outside the mind of 
man, but as the coral reef becomes visible when enough 
insects die, and the outcome defies the wearing tide of 
the sea, so when you put enough atoms together, the reef 
of matter rises above the sea of thought. But now, we 
find the atom inhabited; the tenant is the ion of elec- 
tricity. And this ion, like the earth, has a north and 
a south pole; neither Cook nor Peary has found it yet. 
When motion ceases will matter end? If matter is a 
mode of motion, yes. The story of Doctor Cook's suf- 
ferings in the far north is most tragic; what he knew 
and what he thought are curiously confounded. But he 
is as wise about the pole as we are about anything 
material. Our interpretation of matter is certainly men- 
tal; did the mind of man create matter? Who knows? 
The sword that will behead Mrs. Eddy's body of thought 
is not yet forged in the shop of material science. How 
do we know what the universe is to God? Do we 
know that it is at all? Do we know what it will be 
to us when the caterpillar finds his wings, and the psychic 
becomes pneumatic? Granting that man is the reflec- 
tion, the image of God, that the present material universe, 
body, and earth, and heavens are the interpretation of 
mind, and to all intents and purposes the creation of 
mind, the rest is easy. " Sin is a moral madness," the 
assertion of self, in place of the reflection of God. In an 



214 HONEST DEBTORS 

officeholder, it is perversion of a public trust to private 
gain. In Judas, it was the following of Jesus to Geth- 
semane for thirty pieces of silver; in man, it is denying 
the Allness of God and assertion of the somethingness of 
man. Sin ceases when man turns again to God. Sin is 
Ptolemaic, with man at the center. Righteousness is 
Copernican, with God at the center. Sin is State rights, 
seceding from and rebelling against the central Republic. 
Righteousness is the oath of allegiance and loyalty to God 
— prayer. 

Desire is prayer ; and no loss can occur from trusting God with 
our desires, that they may be molded and exalted before they 
take form in word and deed. . . Prayer cannot change the science 
of being. A request that another may work for us never does 
our work. God is Love. Can we ask him to be more? God is 
Intelligence. Can we inform the infinite Mind, or tell him any- 
thing he does not comprehend? Do we hope to change perfec- 
tion? Shall we plead for more at the open fount, which al- 
ready pours forth more than we can receive? Who would 
stand before a blackboard and pray the principle of mathematics 
to work out the problem? The rule is already established, and 
it is our task to work out the solution. Shall we ask the divine 
Principle of all goodness to do his own work? That work was 
finished long ago; and we have only to avail ourselves of God's 
rule in order to receive the blessing; to understand God is the 
work of eternity, and demands absolute consecration of thought 
and energy. 

Atonement is the exemplification of man's unity with God, 
whereby he reflects divine Truth, Life, and Love. Jesus of 
Nazareth taught and demonstrated this oneness with the Father, 
and for this we owe him endless homage. His mission was both 
individual and collective. Ke did Life's work aright, not only 
in justice to himself, but also in mercy to mortals — to show 
them how to do theirs, but not to do it for them, or relieve them 
of a single responsibility. The atonement of Christ reconciles 
man to God, not God to man; for the Principle of Christ is 
God, and how can God propitiate himself? How can the Christ- 
heart reach higher than itself, when no fountain can reach 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE 215 

higher than its source? Christ could conciliate no nature above 
his own, derived from the eternal love. It was therefore Christ's 
purpose to reconcile man to God, not God to man. Love and 
Truth are not at war with God's idea, and man is this idea. Man 
cannot exceed God in Love, and so atone for himself. Jesus 
aided in reconciling man to God, only by giving man a truer 
sense of Love, the divine Principle of his teachings, which would 
redeem man from under the law of matter, by this explanation 
of the law of Spirit. 

Alfred Farlow, chairman of the Christian Science Pub- 
lication Committee, thus describes the treatment given by 
Mrs. Eddy : " An effort to possess a clear consciousness 
of divine power and presence, with the understanding that 
when the consciousness of the individual is illumined by 
a realization of what God is, that realization overcomes 
the disease as the light dispels darkness." That attempt 
is made whenever a believer in Christian Science tries 
to change the mind of the sufferer, forgets self, and real- 
izes God. And the Master said, " If any man will be my 
disciple, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily and 
follow me." 

God is, man is, matter is not, save to man. Sin is 
assertion of self, and turning from God. Atonement is 
denying of self and returning to God. Prayer is sur- 
render to God, to know and do his will. Sickness is real 
to the man who is sick, not to God who knows nothing 
of the body in which man believes his sickness is. Sin 
and sickness are the results of self-assertion and realiza- 
tion. Holiness and health are the results of realizing 
God. Christian Science is an attempt to realize here and 
now what Christianity promises for there and then. 

Christian Science Unorganized Speculation 

What shall we say then ? That Christian Science, like 
the centaur of antiquity, is a myth, a creature of the 



216 HONEST DEBTORS 

imagination, unlike anything in the heavens above, the 
earth below, or the waters of the sea? "There is one 
flesh of man, another of beasts " ; the body and limbs of a 
horse cannot unite with the body, arms, and brains of a 
man ; the mouth of a man could not prepare food for the 
body of a horse; the mind of a man would override the 
instincts of a horse. Christianity is on one level, science 
on quite another; science is organized knowledge, deal- 
ing with facts and phenomena. A Christian may be a 
scientist, may not be. A scientist may or may not be a 
Christian. 

Christian Science is unorganized speculation. It re- 
minds one of Hamlet's cloud, shaped like a camel, or wea- 
sel, or whale as the fancy serves. The " Key to the 
Scriptures " does not fit the lock. Mrs. Eddy bears the 
Bible away, as Samson bore off the gates of Gaza, she 
does not open the Scriptures ; she removes them, the hinges 
are not left. " The Key " would mean just as much with- 
out the Scriptures as it does with. Her system of thought 
has no more to do with the Bible than the airship has to 
do with the field on which it casts a flying shadow, or a 
barnacle has to do with the ship to which it clings. It is 
more remote from the Bible which it claims to explain, 
than from Doctor Quimby's system which it denies. It 
is a world-view, as idealism and materialism are world- 
views. One man assumes that the mind is the source 
and spring of all that is. Another assumes that matter 
is the egg from which mind takes its winged flight. 
Admit the assumption of either, and you are borne on 
to the conclusion. Either assumption is a toboggan ; once 
in and started, you can only cling, gasp, and go. 

Admit Mrs. Eddy's assumption, that she presents the 
universe from God's point of view, and the rest is easy. 
Granted that, she is the only one to guide the airship. 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE 217 

God is all, man is the reflection of the Allness, all else is 
a cipher, conjured up by the mind of man, an imaginary 
line around nothing. 

I deny the assumption. Man creates language; lan- 
guage is the expression of thought. Man fills words with 
thoughts, as the bee fills the cells with honey. Cell and 
honey are both made by the bee; language and thought 
are both created by man, they express and nourish the 
mental life. 

Matter is God's language, God's cell. Life is God's 
honey in the cell, thought in the language. Matter is as 
real to God as the cell is to the bee, or words are to man. 
But honey is the real treasure to the bee, thought to the 
man, life to God. 

That we do not understand matter and life as God does 
is no proof that they are not real to him. To the child 
learning to read, the words and sentences are everything, 
the thoughts nothing. To the man, words and sentences 
are nothing, the thought everything. 

The child sees only the printed page, the man sees 
through it to the thought beneath. We are learning to 
read ; by and by we shall see the thought, as God sees it. 

Matter will become to us what it is to him. In the 
meantime, with grammar and lexicon, let us master our 
lesson in the school of life, learning to think his thoughts 
after him, till we know as we are known. 



IV 

SOUL- WINNING 

A proverb is the wisdom of many and the wit of one. A 
bee plunders a hundred flowers to fill one cell with honey. 
A proverb-maker searches a century to pack a phrase, but 
the " phrase glitters like a jewel " five words long upon 
the stretched forefinger of all time. Words are the best 
preservative of thought we have found. Palaces and tem- 
ples crumble to dust; pictures fade; words outlast the 
centuries. Solomon built temples and palaces; not one 
stone remains upon another. He wrote proverbs that 
outlast the centuries. One proverb runs, " He that is 
wise winneth souls. " Wisdom wins. Knowledge comes, 
but wisdom lingers. Knowledge furnishes the raw ma- 
terial for wisdom. Knowledge spins threads. Wisdom 
weaves webs. The woven web covers the naked form. 
Knowledge makes bricks; wisdom erects buildings, and 
buildings are civilization. Knowledge is the apple tree in 
the spring, adorned like a bride for her husband. Wis- 
dom is the tree in the autumn bending beneath the burden 
of fruit that makes glad the heart of man. 

She was a " sweet girl graduate with golden hair." 
She could dance divinely ; play beautifully ; paint pass- 
ably; read, write, and talk in English, French, and Ger- 
man, but she could not think in any language. She had 
never been taught to think. The shelves of her memory 
were filled with the " canned goods " of other people's 
thinking. She knew it was true, for the label said so. 
When she graduated she read an essay on a social ques- 
218 



SOUL-WINNING 219 

tion that had vexed men for a hundred years. When she 
stepped from the platform she disappeared. Why? Be- 
cause there was nothing in her mind that was not in 
books. It is cheaper to buy a book than to support a 
woman. The binding costs less, and you can shut it up 
when you are tired without making any one mad. 

Her grandmother sat in the corner knitting. She was 
a dear old lady with silver hair. She could not dance; 
it was wrong to dance when she was a girl. She could 
not play the piano. She was a past-master at the wash- 
tub. She could not paint ; she had whitewashed the cellar 
walls. She knew nothing of French, or German, and her 
English was uncertain. She Mormonized her speech, 
giving plural verbs to singular nouns, but she was a wise 
old woman — and wisdom wins. When the young wife 
found her husband was losing interest and the matrimo- 
nial bond did not pay, she sought grandmother's advice 
how to renew the investment. Young mothers ask grand- 
mother how to take the babies safely through teething, 
measles, and mumps. They never sought the advice of 
the girl who knew, but of the woman who was wise — 
for wisdom wins. 

" With all thy getting get wisdom." You will not have 
much competition. You can ask your own price for it. 
The man who knows gets fifty dollars for a retainer ; the 
man who is wise gets five thousand dollars. The doctor 
who knows gets five dollars a visit; the doctor who is 
wise gets five hundred dollars for a consultation. Wis- 
dom wins. You may put a wise man where you will — 
the world will find him. If on an island, men seek him 
on rafts; if in the heart of a forest, they cut their way 
to him with axes. He does not need to advertise. 

Many years ago the Philistines had the Hebrews under 
foot. There was not a smith in all Israel. A woman sat 



220 HONEST DEBTORS 

under a palm tree and prophesied. Men listened to her 
speech. She organized an army and broke the back of 
Philistia — but Deborah was a wise woman, and wisdom 
wins. 

The Soul the Companion of God 

Wisdom wins souls, for wisdom knows values and the 
soul is the most valuable created force in the universe. 
It is the companion of God, the son of the Eternal. 
Last year we had a fire in Brookline. Thousands of dol- 
lars in rugs, books, pictures, jewels, and furniture were 
destroyed. Not a tear was shed. The grandmother of 
the family crept out of the second-story chamber window, 
dragged her broken body under a bush, was taken to the 
hospital, and died on the third day. The family wept. 
Things may be replaced; a life blotted out cannot be re- 
stored. The soul is of more value than all things. 

The soul is valuable, first, because of its essential being. 
When I was living in Bufifalo a physician and surgeon 
went with the Federal Regiment to the Philippines. After 
the brown brothers were convinced that the white men 
were their friends the doctor was dismissed from service 
and returned by way of Japan. In Tokio he bought a 
temple mirror, a bit of metal the size of a tea-plate. The 
back looks like a relief-map of New England. The 
face is polished until it equals a plate-glass mirror. I 
looked into it and saw what is to me the most interesting 
fact in Nature — my own face. If you had looked you 
would have seen what interests you most — your own 
face. I handed the mirror back to the doctor and con- 
gratulated him on having so fine a piece of metal work- 
manship. He replied : " You haven't seen the mirror. 
The man who made that was not thinking of the human 
face. Tomorrow morning hold it up in the light of the 



SOUL-WINNING 221 

sun and look at the ceiling." I did, and there traced in 
lines of light was the face and form of Gautama Buddha, 
the great king of the East. Today four hundred million 
men and women worship him. Where would you not 
go — what would you not do, to see the face of the God 
you worship? And yet these worshipers in the East see 
the sun kiss the mirror and the god is born. God hath 
wrought himself into the soul of man. It is the business 
of the church to lift the soul into the light of the Up- 
lifted Countenance that there may be joy in the presence 
of the angels when a new soul flashes back the divine 
likeness. 

The Soul's Outlook 

Secondly, the soul is of value because of its output. He 
who heals the spring heals the outflow. On the edge of 
the Jordan plain in Palestine is a great spring. Every 
drop of water flowing over its edge makes the desert 
blossom like the rose. Centuries ago it was a fountain 
of death. Every drop of water blasted vegetable life. 
A prophet cast salt into the spring and healed the out- 
put, and the flow through the centuries witnesses to his 
power. So the man who wins a soul for God wins the 
output. Darwin says that all the earth food furnished 
to the vegetable world is prepared by the earthworm. 
Plants live on predigested food. Raw soil would kill the 
plant with indigestion. What we call civilization is the 
expression of human thought. Today a thought — to- 
morrow a building; today a thought — tomorrow a ma- 
chine; today a thought — tomorrow a picture; today a 
thought — tomorrow a city. And he who wins the thinker 
wins the thought. When the daughter of Pharaoh lifted 
Moses from the Nile she unhinged the gates of slavery. 
She made the law of Sinai possible, organizing Israel, 



222 HONEST DEBTORS 

and the foundation of Christianity. If she had known, 
she could have strangled the life in a moment and spared 
the land she loved — saving Moses, she made Israel and 
Christianity possible. When Hannah devoted Samuel to 
God she gave the life that organized Israel into a king- 
dom, anointed David as king, founded the School of the 
Prophets, and made the Hebrews a power in the Eastern 
world. By the banks of a Virginia river a woman 
shaped the life that formed the Republic. On the edge 
of the Western wilderness a woman molded the life that 
freed the Negro from the bondage of slavery. Men make 
governments. Women make men. Seek the ballot if 
you wish, but do not neglect the cradle. The first mort- 
gage controls the property, and she who wins the soul 
wins the output. 

The Sources of Wisdom 

Where shall we get wisdom? From literature and 
from life. A good book is the life-blood of a master 
spirit saved up for a life beyond life. Books are the 
reservoirs that start the thinking of the centuries. A 
young man goes to his pastor and says, " Pastor, I want 
to be a doctor/' A sensible choice — for so long as men 
are born of the flesh they are born to fleshly ills, and 
with inherited ills we must needs have doctors for the 
flesh. The young man takes four years in the academy, 
four years in the college, and then his mind is so tem- 
pered and edged that it will not turn when he cuts green 
cheese. Three years at the medical school and a year in 
the hospital ; then the state turns the body of citizens to 
the care of the doctor — but when the wind blows across 
the young man's mind you smell drugs. He thinks 
symptoms, dreams of diseases, and plans cures. When 
he shakes a young lady by the hand he runs his finger 






SOUL-WINNING 223 

up her wrist to feel her pulse. When he looks into her 
eye he searches for symptoms of health and disease. 
When she is talking he seeks to catch a glimpse of her 
tongue to see if it is coated. He cannot help it. The 
literature that he has studied has molded and shaped his 
inner life. His brother prepares for the bench. Academy 
and college are followed by the legal school. When he 
proposes he argues as though before a jury. When he 
prays he pleads with the judge. The literature has 
shaped his thinking. Preparation for any profession in- 
volves a mastering of the literature, and the literature 
molds the mind. If you want wisdom to win souls, study 
the Book of Life, the one book that sums up what men 
have been taught by God and the way to God and what 
God has revealed of himself to man and the secret of 
finding him. Search the Scriptures, for they are they 
that testify to the One who is made unto us the wisdom 
of God. Study them as the doctor studies the medical 
book or the lawyer the book of law, and the wisdom of the 
book becomes your wisdom and you will win souls. 

The second source of wisdom is life. A book is a door 
into the heart of the author, not a barrier between the 
writer and the thinker. In preparing for college I 
studied a grammar written by a professor at Brown Uni- 
versity. I thought I knew something of the man from 
the book, but months in a classroom taught me how little 
a man can put of himself into a book. The Bible is not 
a substitute for God but a way to God, and he who speaks 
to you through others will speak to you directly if you 
seek him. If any man lack wisdom let him ask of God, 
who giveth freely to all men and upbraideth not. Do 
you know how to pray ? " Ask, and ye shall receive ; 
seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened 
unto you." But, you say, you have not received. Have 



224 HONEST DEBTORS 

you asked? The door has not been opened. Have you 
knocked at the door or bruised your knuckles on the 
walls ? You have not found. But have you sought ? Do 
you know how to pray? The other day a lad went into 
a drug-store. He deposited a cent in an opening in a 
metal box fastened to the wall. He drew out a little 
package. He went away with it. He knew what he 
wanted. He knew where it was. He knew how to get it. 
He knew what to do with it. He had offered a metal 
prayer to a metal god and got a gum answer and chewed 
it. Do you know what you want? Where to get it? 
How to get it? What to do with it? You went to the 
telephone and called up a friend. You made known your 
request and walked away. Your wife said, " Did you get 
him?" "Yes." "What did he say?" " Oh, I don't 
know, I couldn't wait for an answer." Then you wasted 
your friend's time and yours. Yet this is a parable of 
much that we call prayer. The value of prayer is in the 
answer, not the request. And you haven't time to wait 
for the answer. Take time to be holy. It takes time to 
be holy. Some things you can hurry; prayer cannot be 
hastened. I have a friend in Buffalo who owns an electric 
automobile. He watches the indicator carefully lest he 
be left with a dead machine far from home. He uses the 
last of the current to reach the garage. The manager 
puts the machine against the dynamo. The owner sleeps. 
The dynamo purrs through the night, and a new soul is 
born. Do you know how to put your soul up against God' 
and leave it there, and let him pour himself into your life 
and renew your strength ? That is prayer. 

The Use of Wisdom 

We can get wisdom to win souls through the Bible and 
from God in prayer. How shall zve use it? First, in life ; 



SOUL-WINNING 225 

secondly, in speech, for though speech is a part of life, 
yet we divide the two. Be what you want others to be- 
come. Example is more than speech. You cannot hope 
to win others to a life you do not live, to a God you do 
not love, to principles you do not practise. 

Secondly, in speech. You say : " I don't like to hear 
that man talk. He doesn't live what he professes." Is 
that why you are silent? We pervert words. For many 
years I advertised the " Sunday Service." Now I adver- 
tise the " Sabbath Worship." You called on John the 
other Sunday morning. His wife said that he had gone 
to service. You asked, " What — does John work on the 
Lord's Day?" She said, "Why, no, he has gone to 
church to service " ; and you went over to the church to 
see what John did at service. You found him sitting at 
the end of a pew. He joined in the singing of the hymns. 
He bowed his head during the prayer. He gave a silver 
piece to the collection, and settled back comfortably for a 
spiritual massage while the preacher gave what he had 
gathered of thought during the week, and he called that a 
" service." The other evening I went into my kitchen to 
get a glass of milk and a cracker. I found the maid 
sitting on one side of the table and her friend on the 
other side. He was talking. She was listening. She was 
" at service." That's what I pay her five dollars a week 
for, and when she changes to another home that wants a 
character I can write that she is a good girl. I caught 
her at " service " faithful. It is only in the religious 
world that we think of service in the passive voice, being 
ministered unto, rather than ministering. The one most 
useful form of service is speech. u But/' you say, " I do 
not believe in talking about religion; it is too sacred." 
Then you are wiser than your Master, Christ. He wrote 
no book. He organized no church. He sent out preach- 



226 HONEST DEBTORS 

ers. He bade his disciples to go into all the world and 
preach, discipling all nations. Out of the abundance of 
the heart the mouth speaketh, and out of the emptiness of 
the heart the mouth is silent. If you have no stock on 
the shelves, do not make an exhibit in the show-windows. 
Listen to a parable. John came to me the other day and 
said, " Pastor, do you know Jane ? " I said, " Yes, nice 
girl, isn't she?" "Nice? She's the only one in the 
church." " Well, you go and tell her that. She will 
never know what you think of her by your telling me." 
So John called on Jane once. I asked him afterward 
if he had called and he said, " Yes, once." " Why not 
again?" "Oh, it's no use." I asked Jane, "Did John 
call on you?" " Yes, once." " Why not again ? " "Oh, 
what's the use ? " " What did he do ? " " Why, he didn't 
do anything. He sat silent for a half hour, and then 
walked out." I said to John afterward, " Why didn't you 
tell her what your feelings toward her were ? " " Oh," 
he said, " love is too sacred a subject to talk about " — and 
John is still single and he will be single until he recovers 
from that folly. Love too sacred to be talked about? 
Don't you know that a man in love can't talk of anything 
else, that a man who loves his child is always willing to 
talk about her, that a man who loves his country is al- 
ways boasting about it? The passion of love, like a fire, 
blazes and conquers everything it touches. The trouble 
with you, my friend, is that you have lost your first love 
and now fall back upon the untruth that love is too sacred 
to be talked about. 

A Bond and Its Coupons 

During my life in Buffalo we had an evangelistic ser- 
vice under Doctor Torrey. We summoned a gentleman 
from Philadelphia to talk to us about doing personal 



SOUL-WINNING 227 

work. He gave the experience to about one hundred and 
fifty of us, so it was not a personal matter. He said : 
" My name is so and so. I have charge of the traveling 
agents of a large business enterprise. I teach men how 
to talk to sell goods. I am a Presbyterian. I have been 
a member of the church for twenty-three years. I have 
the highest-priced pew on the right-hand side of the 
broad aisle. I pay my rental regularly. I subscribe to 
the missionary enterprises of the church. I attend the 
service faithfully. But for twenty-three years I have not 
won a soul to Christ." He had never tried to. He had 
never spoken to a man about Christ. He had never 
urged the claims of the Master. The twenty-three years 
might become twenty-three centuries of silence without 
winning a soul. 

" Doctor Torrey came to Philadelphia. I joined the 
chorus. After the first sermon the doctor urged us all 
to do personal work. I sat and watched while the others 
worked. Alexander turned to me and asked. ' Are you a 
Christian?' I said, ' I am, sir.' 'Why don't you go to 
work ? ' I was mad enough to knock him off the plat- 
form. What right had any man to talk to me like that? 
Then conscience said, ' Are you a Christian ? ' I replied, 
'Yes.' 'Why don't you go to work?' I can knock 
Alexander down but I could not silence conscience. I 
stepped off the platform and met a man — he was coming 
toward the pulpit. I asked, ' Are you a Christian ? ' He 
said, ' No.' ' Do you want Christ ? ' 'I do.' I sat with 
him and led him to Christ. Oh, the joy of it ! There is 
no joy like it." He then took a small book from his 
pocket and said (that was nine months ago) : " Here 
are the names and addresses of two hundred and twenty 
men whom I have won to Christ in nine months. 
Twenty -three years of silence and not a soul won! 



228 HONEST DEBTORS 

Nine months of pleading and two hundred and twenty- 
souls won." 

Off which bond will you take your coupons on the day 
of judgment, the bond of silence or the bond of speech? 

Wisdom wins. Wisdom wins souls because it knows 
values. We get wisdom from the Bible and in prayer. 
We use wisdom in life and in speech, and wisdom wins. 



ADONIRAM JUDSON 1 

The name of a babe is sometimes a prophecy fulfilled by 
the character of the man. Isaac called his second-born 
Jacob, supplanter. He supplanted Esau twice. Mary 
named her babe Jesus, Saviour. He saved his people 
from their sins. In ancient Israel Abda named his son 
Adoniram, " the lord of exaltation/' Solomon sent a 
levy of thirty thousand men to Lebanon to cut timber for 
his building. Adoniram was over the levy. A man who 
can manage thirty thousand laborers for months without 
a strike may well be called " the lord of exaltation." 
Rehoboam succeeded Solomon and sent Adoniram to col- 
lect tribute. The people stoned him to death. Thus he 
gave his life in service and sacrifice to his king. In 
Maiden, Massachusetts, in the Congregational parsonage, 
a babe was born and named Adoniram — " the lord of 
exaltation." He gave his life in service and sacrifice to 
a greater than Solomon and to the building of a kingdom 
that has no frontier. 

Heredity and environment have much to do with shap- 
ing character. The web of life is spun of threads woven 
by heredity and environment. Adoniram's father was a 
stern disciplinarian of the Puritan type. His mother was 
one of the finest products of New England home life. 
Strength and beauty were the two pillars in Adoniram's 
temple. 

# * An address delivered on the occasion of the Judson Centennial Celebra- 
tion in Tremont Temple, Boston, Massachusetts, June 24, 19 14. 

229 



230 HONEST DEBTORS 

The traveler in London seeks Saint Paul's Cathedral, 
an island of silence in a sea of sound. Tired of the strife 
of tongues, he finds rest under the shadow of the Eternal 
Presence in the great cathedral. The massive walls and 
springing dome shelter the bodies of men who helped to 
make England great. Nelson made her mistress of the 
seas. Wellington broke the spell of Napoleon and freed 
Europe from the power of France. Greater than either 
Nelson or Wellington is Sir Christopher Wren, who re- 
built Saint Paul's and the city of London after the great 
fire. In greater London are sixty parish churches 
planned by the great architect. On the wall of Saint 
Paul's is a memorial tablet to the memory of Sir Chris- 
topher Wren, " If you would behold my monument, look 
about you " — on the beauty of the cathedral ; on the city, 
the capital of an empire; on the sixty parish churches 
nourishing the soul of the city, and on the score of 
churches in the American Republic built after the model 
of the parish church. 

In the city of Maiden, Massachusetts, is a noble meet- 
ing-house. On one of the walls is a tablet : 

IN MEMORIAM. 

REV. ADONIRAM JUDSON 

BORN AUGUST 9, 1788. 
DIED APRIL 12, 1850. 

MALDEN, HIS BIRTHPLACE. 

THE OCEAN, HIS SEPULCHRE. 

CONVERTED BURMANS, 
THE BURMAN BIBLE, HIS MONUMENT. 

HIS RECORD IS ON HIGH. 



ADONIRAM JUDSON 231 



The Years of Preparation 

At three years of age, Judson, taught to read by his 
mother, read a chapter in the Bible to his father. At 
four years of age he gathered the neighboring children 
and preached to them. At seven years of age he studied 
and settled the question of the motion of the earth and 
sun. At sixteen years of age he entered Providence 
College, now Brown University, a year in advance. He 
was graduated three years later as valedictorian. 

There are mental maladies, as well as physical dis- 
eases. Young men have mental mumps, " swelled head." 
In college Judson became a French infidel. Our fathers 
imported their political principles from France; the same 
ships brought over French infidelity. Few college stu- 
dents in those early days were Christians. Judson was 
led into the field of religious speculation by one of the 
most brilliant students in college. Reaching home he re- 
vealed his spiritual vacuum. His father reasoned with 
him, his mother wept and prayed in vain, for what is 
unreasonable cannot be reasoned away, what is not of the 
heart cannot be wept away. Germ diseases have their 
run — if the man is in good health, he conquers ; if in poor 
health, they conquer. Much depends upon mental fiber 
whether a man is conquered by or conquers infidelity. 
Following his graduation Judson taught school a year 
and wrote text-books. His father was a wise man and 
sent him on a year of travel, hoping that meeting men 
would brush away the webs woven by speculation. Infi- 
delity comes of overmuch thinking and too little action. 
Real life destroys unbelief as the sun burns off mists. 
Infidelity is born of books ; religion is the life of God in 
the soul of man. There are inventors of religion as of 
machinery. The Patent Office is crowded with inventions 



232 HONEST DEBTORS 

that do not work, and the test of reality proves the 
worthlessness of many inventions and more speculations. 
During his year of wandering, Judson joined a strolling 
band of actors and with them cheated the landlord of his 
just dues again and again — practical infidelity. If a man 
does not believe in God, why should he treat men hon- 
estly? (He afterward retraced his steps and paid the 
bills.) On his return trip he was a guest in a wayside 
inn. A dying man was in the next room. The groans 
of the sufferer, the noises made by the nurse, made sleep 
impossible. He began to think : " Suppose I were the 
dying man; am I ready? Suppose the dying man were 
my friend the infidel, is he ready ? " The noises stopped : 
silence fell upon the house. In the morning the land- 
lord told him that the man was dead. " Do you know 
who he was ? " " Yes ; Mr. , the most brilliant stu- 
dent ever graduated from Providence College. " Two 
words flashed through Judson's mind. " Dead ! Lost ! " 
Turning his face toward home he entered Andover Semi- 
nary as a special student. He was not a Christian, but a 
seeker for the truth. In the Gulf Stream of seminary 
life the iceberg of his infidelity melted. Unbelief in 
phrases could not withstand the power of religion in life. 
A sermon by Rev. Claudius Buchanan turned his mind 
toward the mission field, and with five other young men 
he pledged his life to the foreign field. 

A Man's Choice the Hinge of History 

There was then no foreign missionary organization in 
the young republic. The States were a mission field, not 
a missionary force. Four of the young men formulated 
a petition and signed it, pleading with the churches to 
organize a foreign missionary board and send them to the 
foreign land. Young men, who have a long lease of life, 



ADONIRAM JUDSON 233 

are short on patience. Older men, with a short lease of 
life, are long on patience. We pay years and acquire 
patience. These elderly men advised the young men to 
wait, and they would do the best they could. But Judson 
grew impatient and took an English ship for London 
that he might interest the English Christians in the mis- 
sionary movement. There was a war on between France 
and England. The ship bearing the young missionary 
was seized by a French privateer, and he was thrust 
into the hold with the common sailors. Seasickness is 
the mother of pessimism. During the seminary course, 
Judson had received an invitation to become a tutor in 
English literature in Providence College and also a call 
to be the associate pastor of Doctor Griffin in Park Street 
Church, Boston. In the hold of the ship, a prisoner with 
the common sailors, sick unto death, he began to question 
the wisdom of his choice. To save himself from insanity, 
he began to translate the Hebrew Scriptures into Latin. 
The ship surgeon, finding the book, asked for the owner. 
They conversed in Latin, and Judson was moved to the 
officers' quarters. Landing in Bayonne, France, he 
marched through the street toward the prison, in com- 
pany with the common sailors. He lifted up his voice in 
the little French he knew, to attract attention. The peo- 
ple laughed at him. He then tried English by way of 
attracting attention. A gentleman from America stepped 
up to him and warned him, " Be quiet, or you will get 
into trouble." Judson replied, " I have accomplished my 
purpose, I will now be quiet." He told his story. The 
American made him a visit, secured his release from 
prison, got him a pass from Napoleon to London, and 
Judson crossed over to England. There was trouble 
then between England and the United States, and the En- 
glish Christians did not care to assume the support of 
Q 



234 HONEST DEBTORS 

the American missionaries. Judson took ship for Amer- 
ica. There he found that the Congregational Church had 
organized their foreign missionary work. Four of the 
young men were ordained to the foreign field. Judson 
and Newell were married and set sail from Salem on the 
Caravan for India. Luther Rice sailed from Philadel- 
phia. England had closed all American ports, and under 
special permit the vessels were allowed to sail on condi- 
tion that they would not salute any ship on the high seas. 

New occasions teach new duties. 

Time makes ancient good uncouth; 
They must upward still and onward, 

Who would keep abreast of truth; 
Lo ! before us gleam her camp-fires, 

We ourselves must pilgrims be, 
Nor attempt the future's portals 

With the past's blood-rusted key. 

Judson was facing a new problem. In a Christian 
country the children of Christian parents were baptized, 
but he was facing the heathen world. Could he baptize 
the children of heathen parents? Should he baptize the 
heathen parents when they became Christians by sprink- 
ling or immersion ? What was the primitive form ? The 
early church baptized adults on confession of faith. 
Seventeen weeks on his way from America to India he 
\ studied the question and made up his mind that he must 
become a Baptist. He conferred with his wife and, with 
a woman's conservatism, she refused to go with him. He 
might become a Baptist ; she never would. They reached 
Calcutta to find a number of books in the library dis- 
cussing the question on both sides. They read the books 
carefully, and soon after their arrival both applied for 
membership in the Baptist church. 

Luther Rice, sailing from Philadelphia, faced the same 



ADONIRAM JUDSON 235 

problem. He applied for membership in the Baptist 
church. They were thousands of miles from home, sepa- 
rated from the churches of which they were members, 
cut off from the source of supplies, without an organiza- 
tion guaranteeing support. Accordingly Rice took ship 
and returned to America to arouse the Baptist churches 
and organize " The General Missionary Convention of 
the Baptist Denomination in the United States of Amer- 
ica for Foreign Missions," which is today known as the 
American Baptist Foreign Mission Society. 

The Years of Service and Sacrifice 

The country of the Indias was under the control of the 
British East India Company, a corporation organized for 
revenue only. They said, " The Indians have religions 
enough of their own, they do not need Christianity, and 
we do not need American missionaries/' and bade the 
American missionaries take their return ship for home. 
Judson and his wife drifted around for many months. 
Luther Rice returned with the pledged support of the 
Baptist churches, and the new mission struck root in Ran- 
goon. You cannot teach eight million people English. 
One man can learn a foreign language. Judson bent his 
energies to the mastery of the Burmese language. He 
spent seven years before he baptized the first convert, and 
translated the Burmese Bible, so that he could teach it 
to the people. It took long years to drive a tunnel 
through the Hoosac Mountains. It took seven years to 
tunnel the Burmese language, but once the work was 
done, a precious freight of truth could be shipped 
through. 

War sprung up between Burma and England. The 
Burmese king could not distinguish between the Ameri- 
cans and the English. They were of the same color, 



236 HONEST DEBTORS 

spoke the same language, worshiped the same God. The 
American missionary drew his money from the English 
bank. The king reasoned that he was an English spy. 
He was seized and cast into prison. For nine months 
he wore three pairs of fetters. It might be well for men 
who believe in the dignity of human nature and the 
divinity of man, to take a course in a heathen prison 
where human nature, untouched by the light of revela- 
tion, expresses itself in terms of prison life. American 
prisons feed the prisoners. Heathen prisons do not. If 
a man is poor, he may starve. If he has rich friends, they 
may buy the privilege of feeding him. Heathen prisons 
are unspeakably filthy. Heathenism knows not the alpha- 
bet of sanitation. The prison keepers are unspeakably 
cruel. Judson was as dainty as a woman in the care of 
his person. He was thrown into a prison whose floors 
were covered with filth, a fellow prisoner with groups of 
Burmese heathen whose minds were as filthy as the soil 
they trod on. Some one had given the King of Burma 
a lion. When he learned that the English had a lion on 
their flag, he had the lion moved to the prison and starved, 
surrounded by the prisoners. 

Mrs. Judson begged the use of the empty cage for 
her husband's room. The noble woman visited him day 
after day and week after week, bringing him clean clothes 
and needed food. She was absent from the prison some 
weeks and returned bearing a babe in her arms. 

As the English soldiers pressed more and more closely 
on Ava, the capital, the king moved the prisoners from 
Ava to Aungbinle. Judson wrote the story of the travel 
in blood on the white manuscript of the Burmese road. 
The servant of a fellow prisoner tore his turban from his 
head and gave half to his master and half to Judson and 
bandaged their feet. Reaching Aungbinle, they were 



ADONIRAM JUDSON 237 

thrown into a more cruel prison and five pairs of fetters 
put on the missionary's ankles, a long rod thrust between 
the manacled legs, and he was suspended for hours until 
his shoulders only touched the soil. His wife followed 
him and ministered to him. Her sufferings had dried the 
springs of food, and the missionary, with manacled 
ankles, carried the starving child from Burmese woman 
to Burmese woman, begging her to feed and thus save 
the life of his babe. 

The English were successful, conquered the Burmese 
king, and made it a condition of peace that all prisoners 
should be released, and Judson became the translator of 
the new treaty. The government offered him three thou- 
sand dollars a year to serve as an English officer. He 
refused the offer and returned to his missionary work. 
His wife's health failed. She died, and he buried the 
body under a hopia tree. The babe soon followed the 
mother, and the body was buried beside her. He re- 
turned to his work of translation and teaching, living in 
an attic over the recitation-room. 

Some years later, he married the widow of George 
Dana Boardman. The work was carried on for many 
years. Her health failing, he started for America with 
his wife and growing family. She died on the journey 
and was buried at St. Helena. He resumed his voyage 
with his children, and reached home at the end of thirty- 
two years' absence, a broken man, his voice a whisper. 
But the Christians of America greeted him as the tide 
answers to the call of the moon. He went from church to 
church, missions his message. Doctor Wayland and Doc- 
tor Kendrick stood by his side and repeated the message. 

After recovering his health and strength, he married 
Miss Emily Chubbuck, June 2, 1846, and started for his 
field. One hundred and thirty-nine days from Boston, he 



238 HONEST DEBTORS 

sighted the mountains of Burma again. After eighteen 
months he took up the task to which he had dedicated his 
life. The work < at Moulmein welcomed him, but he 
longed for Rangoon. Within a year they sailed for and 
settled in Rangoon, leaving their treasures in the house 
in Moulmein. Fire destroyed the house and contents. 
He wrote to a fellow missionary, " The Lord gave and 
the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the 
Lord. ,, The new Burman king was a bigoted Buddhist 
and blocked the work in every possible way. The En- 
glish flag no longer protected them. Mission work was 
carried on in secret. Mr. Judson toiled on with his dic- 
tionary and met a few converts and inquirers in secret. 
Ten Burmans, one Karen, and two Americans gathered 
at the Lord's Supper. Eleven disciples and four inquirers 
met him in secret. In 1813 he entered Rangoon, and in 
1847 he reentered Rangoon and taught eleven disciples. 
His great work was translation and making the diction- 
ary. Hunted like a wild beast, watched by the govern- 
ment, plotted against by Catholic priests, he was at last 
driven back to Moulmein. He toiled like a galley-slave 
at his task of translation. November, 1849, he caught a 
severe cold, followed by dysentery and a congestive fever. 
A sea voyage was the last resort. Within a week of the 
time he bade his wife farewell he died after intense 
agony, and his body was committed to the deep. Three 
weeks after the parting the second child was born; the 
day of his birth was the day of his father's death. Ten 
days after the burial of the father the son sought him in 
the land of life. 

Four choices were possible for Adoniram Judson. He 
might have remained an infidel, lived and died a strolling 
actor. When the last curtain fell and the lights were 
cut off, no one would have honored him. He might have 



ADONIRAM JUDSON 239 

returned to Providence College, become a tutor, a pro- 
fessor, or possibly, with his splendid powers, the presi- 
dent of the college. He might have spent his years set- 
ting the veneer of culture on the coarser grain of student 
life. His life-work ended, death would have been fol- 
lowed by a quiet funeral, a white slab, and forgetfulness. 
He might have become associate pastor of the leading 
church of Boston and, in time, full pastor. He might 
have given his years to the local church, doing a needed 
but a narrow work. At the end of life he would have 
been buried on the edge of Boston, with a polished shaft, 
a month of memory, and forgetfulness. He stood on the 
firing-line for thirty-two years. He has become a world 
power. The eyes of Christendom are turned toward the 
restless sea that covers the quiet body, and the heart of 
Christendom honors the man who counted not his life 
dear to himself but gave his powers to his King. The sea 
has his body in trust. Christ has his spirit. We have 
the inspiration of his life. Another generation in Burma 
waits for the gospel; another generation in America is 
responsible for giving the gospel. We can trust the sea 
to guard her treasure, we can trust the Christ to guard 
his spirit ; can the Christ trust us to do our duty as Jud- 
son did his and honor his memory by carrying on his 
work and doing Christ's will ? 



VI 

RELIGIOUS LIBERTY 

A century and a half ago our political forefathers, tired 
of making bricks without straw, accomplished an exodus. 
Journeying through the wilderness of war they entered 
the land of promise of political equality. They stated the 
causes which impelled them to separation from England, 
and declared: 

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are 
created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with cer- 
tain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and 
the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Govern- 
ments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from 
the consent of the governed. 

Political liberty depends upon obedience to law. Law 
is the expression of will for the regulation of life. 

Three centuries ago our spiritual forefathers accom- 
plished an exodus seeking religious liberty. In the cabin 
of the Mayflower they drew up a compact binding them- 
selves to obey just and equal laws to be made for the 
general good. Religious liberty depends upon obedience 
to law. 

The Puritans settling Massachusetts Bay organized a 
Congregational church, a democracy conditioning liberty 
upon obedience to law. Those who did not obey the laws 
enacted by them were undesirable citizens. 

Henry Dunster, president of Harvard College for four- 
teen years, was turned out of office because he denied 
infant baptism. The doors of the First Baptist Church 
240 



RELIGIOUS LIBERTY 241 

in Boston were nailed up, and Baptists were fined and 
flogged in the colony. 

The Puritans believed in the union of Church and 
State, and imprisoned those who refused to support the 
State Church by paying taxes. 

The First Amendment to the Federal Constitution de- 
clares that " Congress shall make no law respecting an 
establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise 
thereof." Massachusetts refused to accept the amend- 
ment. It was not until 1833 that she divorced Church 
and State. 

In the struggle for religious liberty the Baptists were 
leaders. There are three words, used in different fields 
of thought, that mean the same: contract, treaty, cove- 
nant. A contract is an agreement in the business world, 
a treaty is an agreement in the political world, a cove- 
nant is an agreement in the religious world. Breaking 
of contract demoralizes business, of treaty demoralizes 
states, of covenant demoralizes religion. When either 
contract, treaty, or covenant is a " scrap of paper " the 
foundations are destroyed. 

We speak of the Bible as the Old and the New Testa- 
ment, better, Covenant. The word covenant sums up the 
Hebrew religion. The law was in the ark of the cove- 
nant. Abraham cut covenant with Jehovah. The 
promises to Israel were conditioned upon keeping the 
covenant. When the nation broke the covenant Jehovah 
withdrew the promise. 

Christ gave a new covenant. Religious liberty depends 
upon keeping covenant with Christ. 

A constitution written by men may be amended by 
men. A covenant given by the Christ can be changed 
only by him. 

Every denomination stands for certain great principles. 



242 HONEST DEBTORS 

These determine its separation from other bodies, its 
union with men of like faith. Many of these principles 
are shared by other groups, but not all of them. Many 
of them are now shared which were formerly rejected. 
Our platform of principles has many planks. There are 
differences of interpretation by men who stand on the 
same platform. 

The Right of Private Judgment 

I. Baptists believe in the right of private judgment. 
Every man stands or falls to his own master. Every 
spoke in the wheel is joined to the hub, and held in place 
by the rim. Power comes to each spoke from a common 
center. Every Christian has a personal relation with 
Christ. Every man must digest his own food, and build 
up his own body, every Christian eat his own bread of 
Life. We stand in the open and do not get our " dim 
religious light, through windows richly dight." Every 
man must take the light into his own eyes, and the light 
of Life into his own soul. In the Jewish faith the family 
was the unit of value. When Abraham was circumcised 
the slaves shared the covenant. In the Christian faith the 
individual is the unit of value. Abraham had the right 
of life and death over Isaac. No father has such a right 
now. The state makes every man a citizen as a unit ; the 
father cannot swear allegiance for the son. Every stu- 
dent passes his own examination before graduating; no 
son can graduate on the scholarship of his father. Re- 
sponsibility depends upon the right of private judgment. 
Spiritual birth, like physical birth, is a personal matter. 

The Headship of Christ 

II. We accept the Headship of Christ. He is the Head 
of the church, and the Head over all things unto the 



RELIGIOUS LIBERTY 243 

church. He does not share his authority with any coun- 
cil, any bishop or pope, any tradition. His word is our 
law. In the " Charge of the Light Brigade " " somebody 
blundered," but not the men who obeyed the order. In 
our army Christ is the Captain. He never blunders, and 
it is ours to obey. If he thinks enough of an order to 
give it, we must think enough of it to obey it. The law 
of the member is found in the head ; it is not for the hand 
to veto or amend the order from the brain. No man is 
under bonds to accept Christ, he may reject him by the 
use of his will, but having accepted him as Lord, no man 
has a right to change his orders. Every kind of life 
comes under law. Fooling with law forfeits the life. 
" There is a law of the spirit of life." We trifle with it 
at our peril. A Christian has but two duties, to find out 
what Christ commands, to obey what he commands. The 
will of Christ is the end of argument, the beginning of 
action. Doing, not dodging duty, is the mark of a good 
man. " Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it." The mar- 
riage service reads, " Love, honor, and obey." It is quite 
customary to cut out the " obey." This may be done by 
mutual agreement, but when the soul weds Christ by 
faith, no one has the right to cut out " obey " without the 
Master's will. 

III. In our use of private judgment we accept the Bible 
as the supreme rule of faith and practise. Christ's use of 
the Old Testament commends it to us. The New Tes- 
tament is our source of authority concerning what Christ 
was, is, and commands. It is to us what the guide-book 
is to the traveler, the judgment of the Supreme Court to 
the lawyer, the book of tactics to the soldier. Christ pre- 
ceded the church. The church, the ekklesia, the called- 
out ones, were called out by him. The record of the 
calling is in the New Testament. The church did not 



244 HONEST DEBTORS 

make the Testament. The truth in the book made the 
church. It is not to judge the book, but to be judged 
by it. The disciples went everywhere preaching the word 
given them to preach. A group of men wrote and adopted 
the Constitution, their successors may amend it. Christ 
called the Church, gave it its constitution, without power 
of amendment. Men called, repeated the call, and the 
New Testament is the record of the Man who called 
them, what he said, what he bade them do. The Christ 
called the church and gave it the Book through men he 
taught. His spoken word is our law of life. The record 
of that word is in the Book. It found us, we did not 
find it. It rules us, we do not rule it. 

The Nature of the Church 

IV. We believe that the church of Christ is an or- 
ganization of baptized believers in Christ. An idiot 
asylum is a group of mental degenerates, a church is a 
group of baptized regenerates. To call Jesus Lord is 
proof of spiritual life. The Jews and Gentiles of the 
world nineteen centuries ago became Christians by per- 
sonal acceptance of Jesus as Lord ; there is no other way 
today. The physical food must be taken and digested 
by each one for himself; the mental food must be ac- 
cepted and inwardly digested by each one for himself; 
the spiritual truth that builds up character must be ac- 
cepted by faith and digested by each one for himself. 
Obedience comes after acceptance, and acceptance means 
regeneration by the Spirit. The members of a body are 
sharers of the blood, nerve, life of the body. The church 
is the body of Christ, and we are members in particular. 
The man whose life is surrendered to Christ ought to be 
baptized ; no other has a right to the ordinance. Once a 
man is dead his will is a trust; he cannot change it, no 



RELIGIOUS LIBERTY 245 

one else has a right to. If he were living where he could 
change it, he might come back. Christ left certain com- 
mands, an order of service : " Preach, teach, baptize." 
He is living, he has never changed his will, we ought not 
to. His personal followers baptized only after confes- 
sion of faith; they knew what he meant when he sent 
them forth. The early church was made up of baptized 
believers. That is the mold for the centuries. 

What is Baptism? 

V. As to the form of baptism, using our private judg- 
ment, studying the New Testament, we believe that Jesus 
was immersed, that he commanded immersion on confes- 
sion of faith, that the apostles baptised by immersion on 
confession of faith. That is sufficient for us. To know 
what Jesus did, to know what he commanded, to know 
what his followers did, closes the argument. The word 
used means immersion, the symbol used means immer- 
sion. The Greek Catholic Church practises immersion, 
the Roman Catholic Church practised immersion until it 
believed that salvation depended upon baptism, then 
changed the form to meet the new faith. Dean Stanley 
says: 

Even in the Church of England it is still observed in theory. 
The rubric in the public baptism for infants enjoins that, unless 
for special causes, they are to be dipped, not sprinkled. Edward 
the Sixth and Elizabeth were both immersed. 

The Lord's Supper 

VI. As to the Lord's Sapper, we hold that it belongs 
to the church. We never heard of a group of people 
celebrating the Supper who did not believe in Christ. It 
does not belong to the State or to the world. The early 
church was made up of men and women who had been 



246 HONEST DEBTORS 

Jews or heathen. The Jews would not observe the Sup- 
per until they had accepted Christ. The heathen would 
not observe the Supper while heathen. Only Christians 
cared to remember Christ. There was nobody to invite. 
Christians needed no invitation, others had no desire to 
celebrate the memorial feast. We find no hint of an invi- 
tation, no form of an invitation. The man who has a 
right to partake needs no invitation, the man who has no 
right cannot have it conferred by invitation. The condi- 
tions are very different now. We are surrounded by 
organizations of Christians, we acknowledge that they are 
organized into churches, they observe the Lord's Supper 
as a memorial feast. We do not till them as a field out- 
side the church, we cooperate with them as a force in 
Christian work. Such men and women must be their own 
judges as to their right to the Lord's Supper wherever 
spread. If they have a right they need no invitation; if 
they have no right we cannot confer it by invitation. We 
do not stand by the open baptistery and urge them to 
enter that; why should we stand by the table and urge 
them to partake with us? 

Relation Between Church and State 

VII. We believe in the absolute separation of Church 
and State. When Roger Williams advocated this princi- 
ple he was banished from Massachusetts. Nations be- 
yond the sea still support organized religion by the state. 
The principle of separation advocated by the Baptists 
from the beginning of American history is now accepted 
by all forms of faith except the Roman Catholic. Leo 
XIII, in an encyclical addressed to his flock in the United 
States, January 6, 1895, writes, after noting the un- 
deniable prosperity of the Roman Catholic Church in 
America : 



RELIGIOUS LIBERTY 247 

Yet though all this is true, it would be very erroneous to draw 
the conclusion that in America is to be sought the type of the 
most desirable status of the Church, or that it would be univer- 
sally lawful or expedient for State and Church to be, as in 
America, dissevered and divorced. The fact that Catholicity 
with you is in good condition, nay, is enjoying a prosperous 
growth, is by all means to be attributed to the fecundity with 
which God has endowed his Church, in virtue of which, unless 
men or circumstances interfere, she spontaneously expands and 
propagates herself; but she would bring forth more abundant 
fruits if, in addition to liberty, she enjoyed the favor and 
patronage of public authority. 

November 1, 1885, Pius X, writing of France, says: 

If it be true that any Christian State does something which is 
eminently disastrous and reprehensible in separating itself from 
the Church, how much more deplorable is that in France. 

Portugal adopted a republican constitution, Pope Pius 
X issued a decree nullifying the constitution. 

We of our apostolic authority, reprobate, condemn, and reject 
the law separating Church and State in Portugal. We proclaim 
and announce that whatever it contains contrary to the inviolable 
rights of the Church is null and void. 

Boniface VIII, in the Bull Unam Sanctam affirms : 

The tribunal of the Church is higher than that of the civil 
power. Now, the superior is able to revise the causes of the 
inferior; but the inferior is in no wise able to revise the causes 
of the superior. 

It matters not which pope speaks, he speaks for all time, 
by authority. The Baptist principle, and in this country, 
the Protestant principle, is the absolute separation of 
Church and State. The State must keep her hands off 



248 HONEST DEBTORS 

the Church, and the Church must keep her hands out of 
the pocket of the State. 

The Missionary Field 

VIII. " The world is the field." It is the duty of the 
Church to conquer the world. This conquest is by preach- 
ing, teaching, and living the truth. Each generation of 
Christians is responsible for the living generation of un- 
believers. The living are not responsible for the dead, 
either to preach to them or to pray for them. The liv- 
ing are not responsible for the unborn. The present 
generation of believers is responsible for the present 
generation of unbelievers. We are not, like Lot's wife, 
to look over our shoulders, nor like the apostles on Olivet, 
to stand staring up into heaven, but to go into all the 
world and preach to every creature, responsible for the 
Jerusalem in which we live, the Judea, the Samaria, and 
uttermost parts of the earth stretching around us; the 
limit of responsibility, the last man, of time, the last 
breath. 

Christ faced his generation, we must face our genera- 
tion, filling up what is behind of his sufferings in our own 
body. The living church is the body for the living Christ 
to save the spiritually dead of each generation. When a 
man breaks a contract the appeal is to the courts. When 
a state breaks a treaty the appeal is to arms. When a 
man breaks a covenant the writer of it withdraws the 
spirit and liberty becomes lawlessness. 

Political liberty depends upon obedience to Law. 

Religious liberty depends upon obedience to Law. 

Christ is the Law-giver of spiritual life. " If the Son 
shall make you free, you shall be free indeed." 



